kevinjohnsonmbe

He's delusional! There's no such thing as the opposite/absence of a shoot to kill reality. Target is centre body mass - survival after being shot is unlikely. By his rationale, he would see police relieved of firearms and issued non-lethal systems instead. :banghead:

Mind-bogglingly expensive, no doubt about that. And that goes a long way towards the question of should we / should't we. Deployed submarine launch allows independent global deployment, surprise and the potential ability to launch after the home nation has suffered an attack - further enhancing the deterrent / uncertainty effect. You have to have minimum 4 subs, 1 deployed, 1 recovering from deployment, 1 preparing and 1 in deep maintenance. The early days of air launch via the RAF was a perfect con by the staffies at the Air Ministry - the aircraft lacked the range to deliver the cargo to most of the designated targets and resulted in the requirement for manpower increases to maintain security and operation of bases. It was a classic example of the RAF top brass being clererererer than the ARMY and Navy equivalents. I forget who it was getting hung up about the "...but we'll never use it so it's a waste of time..." argument earlier (pre-shut down.) I'd suggest "use" and "usefulness" are perhaps better ways of thinking about it. Nobody (sane) wants to USE it, but that doesn't mean it doesn't have a use. It's also important to take the whole issue within the broader context of how and why it came into being. It would be my view that it has served a valuable purpose post WWII and through the Cold War period. It started to get out of control and was curtailed by the SALT treaties which provided a kind of 'balance' between the US / USSR. The question of replacement of Trident kind of transcends the political divide - it's bigger than a single party issue and bigger than a single term of government. I'm kind of relieved that the decision has been made to replace - albeit (along with the carriers) at the expense of more conventional forces. We live in uncertain times today and certainly don't know what the future holds. Whilst we might all desire global peace and stability, i think we are better to walk quietly and carry a big stick. Chairman Corbyn's obvious and declared inability to say he would be prepared to press the button if necessary kind of undermines the usefulness of the system. In my book, having it (and we are going to despite what he might want) and not being prepared to say you'd use it (even if you don't really mean it) rather undermines the usefulness and illustrates how singly out of touch with reality the man is. Nobody wants it, nobody wants to use it, but it's here. Having it and telling everyone you wouldn't use it is even more insane than having it. All of that said, I wish we were in a different place and we didn't have it. We're not there yet though.

Has anybody had a positive experience (obviously following an unfortunate event) with these types of policy? I don't have such cover myself, but I know a bloke I used to work with who picked up Lymes disease. After he had correctly educated the GP the diagnosis was confirmed. He tried claiming against loss of earnings but found it all to be too much hassle. Granted he was a recent start up, but the insurers wanted years worth of business paperwork to prove income levels. Just a cautionary note really, worth checking the claims procedure in fine detail before signing up!

Recent allegations of electoral fraud tarnish ALL the parties... (maybe excluding the Greens?) Do you: (A) Live in a glasshouse? (B) Grasp any desperate headline to justify your cause? © Not watch the news or have access to Google? It's not a great reflection on the current state of politics, but equally, probably not the best issue to champion on a single party basis.... Just saying loike...

☮️ man.... 😘 (I know my "humour" is an acquired taste!!)

😁 A matter of degree? The lesser of 2 weevils? Which one is LESS F&D?? I'd (under duress) admit to finding some appeal in some of Corbyn's policies, but for the life of me, I can't see how they will be funded to delivery. There are just too many promises and not enough substance to support. It's La-La land!

Absolutely! A minimum wage (in theory) is a sound aspiration. But to peddle that 'moral' imperative to the gullible masses so as to garner support, whilst either intentionally or ignorantly disregarding the inevitable consequences is fraudulent and deceitful. Perhaps "Fraudulent & Deceitful" would be more appropriate Labour strap-line?

Set yourself up for that one Mr E! You got to shake off that old public sector spectre - it's management / somebody else's fault! :lol:

As I thought last night, it's unfortunate that the nurse on the debate wasn't pulled up on her assertion that her pay was the same as x number of years ago. Perhaps she forgot to mention annual increments...

I'd suggest 9/11 did more to bring republican violence to an end than any amount of talking Felix. That said, it's long been my view that poorly conceived (political) and inappropriately delivered (military) intervention in Ireland was as much the cause of the growth in violence as it was in any way able to attempt to keep a lid on it. Easy in hindsight I guess.

A picture saves a thousand words:

Here's another kick in the slats that may have slipped under the radar for those of the ex Service fraternity: https://www.change.org/p/all-veterans-of-hmforces-armed-forces-national-insurance-contributions?recruiter=726973141&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=facebook&utm_campaign=autopublish&utm_term=des-lg-share_petition-reason_msg Your NI contributions have been changed from 'opted in' to 'opted out' with potential significant negative implications for your qualifying years of contribution to state pension.

The constant striving for "growth" (political, industrial, population etc) is what frustrates me. If only the same focus and energy was expended on striving for "reduction" (living within international, national, personal means) that'd be a better focus of attention.

That's not quite what I meant Felix. It would be normal to expect a progressive scale and it must have an entry point. If the entry points was set, then goes up by X, would it not follow that all associated scales would similarly go up by the factor X? The consequence of not doing so would be a kick in the slats for anyone that was more qualified or taking greater responsibility only to find entry level gets same pay for less graft/experience/skills.

Nobody seems to be acknowledging the inevitable snowball effect either. If the bottom rung becomes £10, the bloke that WAS on £10, now wants £13, the bloke that was on £13 now wants £16 etc, etc...

Now that there Mr E is my Q to start banging on about agricultural subsidy.... (but since it's 1/2 term, I'll take the nipper swimming instead!)

Ah! You're not comparing like-for-like there Gary! We all know our better halves are simply wired into a different logic circuit 😳

Made I larf!! 😀

How can 2 people look at the same thing and see the complete opposite? It's a mad world! 😳

Agreed! Conspiracy theories apart, it "could" be that if they approved their own application AND it was to fell, they'd be obliged to replant - maybe they haven't got the funds to cover (a) the felling (b) the replant / aftercare? Maybe they'd approve a height reduction and retention and avoid the costs at (b)? Or maybe it's as simple as the "risk" is just too low to justify doing anything other than maybe reduce inspection periodicity and the homeowner that is "concerned" is unnecessarily so? Interesting though, LA TPO apps to themselves must be quite rare I'd have thought?

Mark, if you think Corbyn is "honest" you're as misguided as Abbot is racist. You're lapping up everything he says because you WANT to believe it. He knows exactly what you want to believe and he's feeding it to you on a tray. Watch him more closely, most of what he HAS to say (to avoid exposing what he WANTS to say) is crippling him inside. He's being forced to contradict his very DNA to avoid exposing his TRUE colours. If ever there was a more morally corrupt, deceitful, obtuse politician, I'd be at a loss to recall them. Damn! I promised myself I wouldn't get drawn in to this again 😳

Ah bollox! Mate that's dreadful! This forum gives a pretty broad spectrum of life, business, humour, and sarcasm input. It's probably fairly balanced once all that goes through the mix. Have you counted up how many voices said "yes go for it" as compared to those that said "Mmmm?" It's all too late now, but seriously gutted for you. These people crap on our dreams and get away with it. They're worse than opportunistic thieves and I hope karma takes a bigger dump on them.

That wouldn't have legs, we'd just agree then have to find something else!! 🤔

How YOU interpret what I write is a matter for you alone to reconcile. I can, and do, bear no responsibility for that. PM May is not MY leader, other than in the respect that she is the PM of my country. If you can find a post where I've said I voted Tory, I'll buy you a crate. I did say you would have to have taken leave of your senses to vote Labour - I stand by it. I did say the panel were chimps, I perhaps should have said they behaved like chimps. None of which actually matters a tuppenny toss. You will vote Labour (because you believe it.) I will vote Tory (because I don't have a viable alternative.) We'll have to find something else to talk about!

I watched it myself! My point was, it serves no practical purpose and appeals to the X Factor / Jeremy Kyle style of sensational TV. Scroll back have a look.