Tuesday 10th January 2023

[refitman]

Morning all.

[AnatolyKasparov]

Anyone about today?

[refitman]

Well, colour me shocked

[refitman]

[gilsey]

[gilsey]

[frog222]

From the LB --

Drivenbythenumbers 18 minutes ago 13

A nurse who was interviewed during the recent strike pointed out that because they were providing a safe staffing level in intensive care on strike days there were more staff on duty than normal, does this mean the government could be sacked for failing to provide a basic level of service during non strike days?

[AnatolyKasparov]

These proposed "anti-strike" measures are so nonsensical, you might like to think they will just be ridiculed out of existence.

[frog222]

" There, I told you they were skivers .

Even Labour agrees with me ! "

[RogerOThornhill]

Good afternoon.

A slightly bizarre match on Saturday involving a wonder volley, monsoon-like weather, and parakeets - and that was only the second half!

Take a look at the Con column...hardly a ringing endorsement from their own supporters.

[refitman]

Fucking around and finding out

[frog222]

Fucking around and finding out

"We're the People, you can't do that to us ! " LOL

[frog222]

[frog222]

[refitman]

[gilsey]

Shapps is probably the only politician who could give Johnson a run for his money when it comes to lying.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

From the Mirror article Froggy posted above.

Sick or disabled people of all ages will also be spared gruelling reassessments for their benefits if they take a job, and it doesn’t work out within a year.

Sick and disabled people are already allowed to work 16 hours a week, and what re-assessments are these? There haven't been any re-assessments since March 2020, they're only assessing new claims and changes of circumstance. I'm due one in February after having my last one deferred for two years due to Covid shutting everything down but they've never restarted them. Nobody knows why but if I had to guess I'd say the DWP and their outsourced cronies simply don't have the capacity to deal with a backlog that big so we claimants are being left in limbo. Not that I'm complaining.

Focusing on the over-50s, he said: “For people who cannot work, we guarantee security. “For people who do want to work, we’ll stand by them throughout any steps they’re able to take as they journey into employment. “We’ll be there to support people if things don’t work out.”

That sounds lovely. What a welcome change it will be to finally have a benefits system tuned to the claimants needs, offering them a compassionate helping hand rather than threatening to impoverish them at every turn.

Mr Ashworth stressed over-50s who have taken early retirement, draw down pensions or have caring responsibilities would not be forced back to work. But he said hundreds of thousands “want to return” and “obviously if they are on Universal Credit, the conditionality regime” - benefit sanctions - “will apply”.

Ah I see. So all that stuff about guaranteeing security and supporting people was absolute bollocks. Well I never.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

A slightly bizarre match on Saturday involving a wonder volley, monsoon-like weather, and parakeets - and that was only the second half!

Ring necked parakeets? There's a flock of them who've have taken to roosting in a tree in the park next door to me. Initially I wanted them to sod off because they're an invasive species and make a right racket but I must say I've grown quite fond of them. If you stand under the tree when they've all come in to roost and listen they're constantly chuntering away to each other making excellent noises. Chirps, squeaks, whirs, buzzes, it's like listening to a load of little Star Wars droids. They still shouldn't be there though.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Fucking around and finding out

[Sky'sGoneOut]

My brother has voted to strike and I'd very much like to explain to this semi-shaved chimp that it wasn't 'baron bosses' who stopped him voting Tory and made him join a union, it was Michael Gove when he was Secretary for Education.

(I'd like to think me giving him years of drunken abuse for being right wing played a part but in truth it was Gove who deserves all the credit).

[frog222]

Warm bodies , to be used up , Russia has plenty of prisoners ...

[Sky'sGoneOut]

You know it's funny. I think it's common knowledge I'm no fan of Corbyn to say the least but I voted Labour when he was leader because the policies the party espoused struck me as being fairly standard stuff for a social democratic centre left party anywhere else on the continent.

Then Starmer gets in and promises to keep most of those policies. For instance he promised to scrap Universal Credit. Now see above. I remember saying to Adam* something along the lines of 'Corbyn might be gone but the membership have won the argument and Starmer's going to keep all these policies'. I genuinely believed that at the time. That there had been a left wing shift that the parliamentary party couldn't ignore. What a fool.

Thankfully I'm not such a fool that I can't admit that I was wrong. I wasn't wrong about Corbyn so don't even think I'll ever have a change of heart about him but I was wrong about Starmer.

It's telling listening to the faithful explaining to us that once he's in power everything will be different, pedantically pointing to the use of every word he says as if they understand some secret code that we don't, which is all a bit QAnon, Trump, Bolsonaro for my liking.

I'm a simple man and if Labour say they're still going to be bastards to benefit claimants (for example) I'm inclined to believe them. After all, they were last time.

*I do hope Adam is well and enjoying his winnings.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Warm bodies , to be used up , Russia has plenty of prisoners ...

They (Russians and Ukrainians) call these places cities, Soledar had a population of 10,000, it's smaller than where I'm from in the borders.

Mind you...

When the town had been taken in this way and its citizens had submitted, Edward spared no one, whatever the age or sex, and for two days streams of blood flowed from the bodies of the slain, for in his tyrannous rage he ordered 7,500 souls of both sexes to be massacred.... So that mills could be turned by the flow of their blood.

That would be Edward Longshanks (Edward I of England), a charming fellow by all accounts.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Reference.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sack_of_Berwick_(1296)

It's not an original idea to suggest humanities murderous urges will be its undoing but I suspect it's an accurate prediction.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

We're just lucky to live in a time and place where there's a temporary hiatus of human nature in our neck of the woods.