Baldbloke

Big J, I'd also suggest that solar panel charging at night after daytime use of the car might be a bit of a disappointment, and, if using battery storage that you should price that into the equation too.

Trouble is we'd often need two cars as we both work, and even with our 25 Kw wind turbine generation providing free charging I cannot yet see the sums adding up in the UK. And that's with the present fuel prices. Over 3 years, all approximate. Old Diesel Tiguans. 36,000 miles at 40/mpg = 900 imperial gallons = 4091 litres @ £1.75 = £7159.25 X 2 cars = £14318 Depreciation on 2 VW Tiguans 2012 & 2015 = Actually worth more than when they were bought, but say minus £3000. Maintenance X6 self services including X1 timing belt/water pump X 2 sets of discs and pads £500 Set of tyres £400 X2 = £800. Road tax X6@ £160 = £960 £19,578 to run 2 cars for 3 years. MG Motor UK Zs Electric Hatchback115kW SE EV Long Range 73kWh 5 Doors Auto For 3 year lease on 12,000 miles a year, each car would cost £342/month X 36 = £12312 X2 = £ 24,624 + X2 initial payments of £3077. £24624 + £6154 = £30778. I didn't include insurance although that too is a negative as leccy cars cost more to insure. Looks like getting on for double the cost as well as the hassle of looking for chargers and delays on longer trips. You'd also have no residual car values by plumping for the electric vehicles. So even though we are lucky enough to have a cheap or free source of electric I personally can't justify the jump and inconvenience of electric cars, and by the time I could they'll probably have changed the tax incentives.

Wonder whether cutting my private lawns using red remains legal? Not too bothered as my tank is also used for my digger and tractor on my fields, but there appears to be a lack of guidance over non road registered mowers being used privately by punters on their own private property whose business isn’t horticulture.

A good summary of the present green bollocks. A friend has just travelled through Dubai where a litre of petrol can be had for the equivalent of 10 pence. Europe's shitting itself over the implications of being fuel dependent on Russia, has little in the way of alternatives in place so if push comes to shove will undoubtably rewrite its Green agendas to suit. As you suggested, I can't see any of the most polluting superpowers (or one's that aspire to be) giving two shits over green legislation that we restrict our output over. Marine diesel is not only the worst pollutant, but these engines are absolutely enormous too.

I think you’re correct in that the standing charge was higher, but that the Kw unit cost for some reason was less for the three phase.

Two of our very mature beech trees started showing similar issues a couple of years ago. The leaf canopy has thinned too. I’m reckoning on my trees being on their way out. They are approaching 200 years old.

Until 14 years ago I had three phase to run my compressor, welders and fan for my forge. The house was next to the workshop and it paid to take a phase from the workshop supply to run the house at the much cheaper rate than the domestic supply. Maybe the pricing ratio has changed since then?

Or Sturgeon’s mother[emoji1313]

We have a Scottish (don’t know if English law differs here) small holding amounting to 8 acres including large gardens. I let out the paddocks for grazing. I have very mature coniferous trees growing within striking distance of a neighbour’s house. Although I have house and contents insurance, I pay an additional insurance cover for the ground separate from the house of just over £200/annually to insure third party risks on the small holding. Did I wrongly assume: my trees, my responsibility, if they were to fall? However, I was much happier during the gales knowing I’d paid for the cover.

Hi all, I’m in a northern German town called Kassel that seems to show that it must have been levelled in the 40s. Picture here shows some trees in the square. Any idea what these heavily pollarded/pruned trees are?

The best thing Germany could do is to take the hit and refuse anything coming from that new gas line. That’d be a decent sanction.

And even that was dropped once it was known Sturgeon and Starmer had been guilty of the same.

A very small part of it.

I’m off tomorrow to deliver a small amount to the border of Ukraine. Amazing how generous the people are in Moray. We reckon on having amassed approaching a tonne of goods donated and delivered to my home and workplace within 48 hours. People and businesses have been utterly selfless in their attitudes. Almost shed a tear or two on occasion [emoji1] Anyway off down to join a co-pilot and bigger covered trailer tomorrow before catching the Hull overnighter on Thursday.

The threats of joining NATO was possibly the final straw for Putin. Not that it’s excusable, but someone previously mentioning buffer zones had a valid point. This along with the potential of Russia losing access to Black Sea ports for trade and military use. Reference to Ukraine being a European country seems a bit of a stretch by the Media and western governments. It’s no wonder there’s no appetite for outside countries engaging Russian troops or planes. It’s only Russia and China that have hypersonic nuclear missiles. Imagine what would happen if Russia was being taught a lesson in a ground war by arrogant western forces with such a nutter in control of these weapons. The Media might be acting with their usual judge and jury attitude, but I’m happy that any Blair type gung ho wankerism is absent. Personally I’d isolate Russia from all and any trade including oil product export. With tax on fuel all governments have adequate leeway to temporarily take a tax loss, and encourage the ramping up of production from existing fields to make up the deficit, although I realise not all types of crude are useable for all applications. Russia’s continuing access to oil revenues is merely aiding and funding the continuation of conflict as most of these oil reserves/revenues are state owned and controlled. You only have to look at a map to see why the West is so keen to make Ukraine a western state and why Putin doesn’t concur. It’s also a vast country with a high agricultural output. We can expect the price of our future loaves of bread to rocket alongside our fuel costs.

37 sq M floor with high ceilings and this little Arrow keeps us too warm at times

Salvation Army is one of the few charities where most donations go to good causes rather than being a self serving business.

Yes, correct. I’m coming from who organises medical needs. Sure, OH provides the handrails, raised toilet seats and other kit, but it tends to be clinicians who initially refer onto social services when there’s a need. Yes they’re separate departments but just a few years ago there was a change up here where we were notified of our dept being partnered with the local Council, although we remain NHS employees. Social care is accessible through note referrals or a call to someone whose on call. This happens when we arrive at someone’s home at 2am and need to go through the rigmarole of contacting them because the single mother is requiring hospitalised and there’s no one to look after her baby and kids. Or, when a carer is the one of a partnership and is desperately needing hospitalised and the other partner is stuck in a wheelchair.

That would be May time up here with that amount of leaf.

Your doctor at your nominated surgery is the one who should be arranging a care package as well as just in case medication and even a syringe driver if required later on. At least that’s how it works up here. It can be done through our out of hours service but should be done by the patients doctor within the community. A hospital discharge usually just involves instructions and drugs to serve long enough for the patients doctor to do his or her job. Likewise, any referrals for additional services and even hospital admission is routine for the patients doctor to organise. It’s just a sad fact that inadequate care packages are sometimes in place, or a patient suddenly goes downhill quickly and needs emergency help (or an hospital admission) such as ours in out of office times.

Our local Marie Curie nurses are used on a need basis and most definitely not just for the last couple of days. Some patients can be known to them for a couple of years or even more. Our dispatchers in Aberdeen raise the calls as jobs for the girls as they come in.I believe they are funded through charitable donations, local funding and something out of the NHS budget, but I don’t know the detail. As I suggested, I’m ignorant as to how much McMillan nurses do. When my mother in law was diagnosed she got one visit and a heads up on how to access grants towards care etc. After the one visit there wasn’t a follow up. That was in Angus. I do believe they operate solely on a charitable basis which may explain why their resources are more limited. I’m sorry for your loss, and can empathise through my parents going through the same issues.

Just my tuppence about what is provided in Grampian. Remember I just drive the out of hours doctors, nurses and paramedics and I am not clinical. There has also been no mention, as yet, of the Marie Curie teams that do wonderful hands on work for palliative patients. We are very fortunate up here that their work is partly Council funded and they also work alongside us in out of hours at nhs Grampian. Our MC teams cover a vast area and are often stowed out with work. We pick up the additional work if they are busy elsewhere. My understanding of McMillan is that they provide assistance and advice over what’s available rather than hands on care. But I could be wrong….. The slide into GPs opting out of of out of hours was thanks to a shortsighted Labour government. If you were suddenly offered similar pay without the need to be on a rota for out of hours care it’s likely most would jump at the chance too. However, up here at least we’re quite proud of the out of hours care we provide, and a priority system of visits is done to provide suitable triage and pain relief as soon as is possible. Day time practice is supposed to set up care packages but we’re the ones chasing our tails overnight and at weekends when daytime practices are closed and plans are failed to be put in place. Imagine how difficult it is to organise things when relevant office workers/consultants/social workers are asleep. Out of hours provide a full 48 hours of extra care each week than daytime, and that doesn’t include holidays either. We also have less resources in clinician numbers as well as covering multiple practice areas with the equivalent of less clinicians than one practice would have. Prior to Covid we often had wasted visits over poor triaging by third parties and frequent flying hypochondriacs. With the clinicians doing their own triaging of patients it’s now rare to waste a visit. Us drivers are also used to deliver medication and contact patients in order to speak to clinicians over daytime lab result concerns. This when deemed suitable in order to keep clinicians triaging at base. About 20% of our visits is to care and nursing homes. The out of hours service up here is not looking to be in danger of going private either, and the nurses involved are truly 100% caring in their attitudes. Very few people would accept the pay for what they do. The OPs (John) post and offer is generous, and would be helpful navigating the tricky ins and outs of palliative care requirements and how to access a way forward. I do agree about Social Services by the way. They generally seem to attract the kind of wanker whose jaw you’d like to break. What pisses me off is that the out of hours contact has to be left a voicemail, to which he or she will answer when they deem it worth bothering. Meanwhile you’re wasting a clinicians time sitting in a car outside of the patients house. All because the Social Dept has made an inadequate plan due to their ineptitude. Perhaps we are more lucky up here with the care that’s available?

Seem to remember the potential failure of the tree and where it could hit (the listed building) was mentioned in the initial application to counter the TPO.

Point 5. Suggests over Financial Considerations that financial recompense may be considered due to damage caused by the TPO. Maybe time to let your insurers loose on the Council?

I don’t know anything about disease on beech trees, but we had something similar. Two years of a whitish stain followed by small sections of bark coming away along with the canopy having a general reduction in leaf. That was one of the trees that blew over a few weeks ago. The rootball seemed weak and little of it came away with the trunk as the tree came down. Your tree is beside a road so it might be worth getting an inspection from someone suitably in the know as well as making sure your insurance is up to date.