Politics Election 2019

Who will you vote for 2019 UK GE

  • Con

    Votes: 9 37.5%
  • Lab

    Votes: 3 12.5%
  • Lib Dem

    Votes: 9 37.5%
  • Brexit

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Other

    Votes: 3 12.5%

  • Total voters
    24
  • Poll closed .

DaGaffer

Down With That Sorta Thing
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So how much does it cost per household per year?

Also, out of interest (not expecting you to be able to answer) is it less environmentally damaging than the privately owned equivalent?

For example: Two adjacent forests in mid-wales. One owned by Natural Resources Wales, other by a private company. Private owner was complaining to me that NRW wouldn't sell them their forest - despite them not making a profit on it, but him making a profit on his.

Problem is - he's an egregious corner-cutter in pursuit of his profit. I was with an environmental manager and an ecologist on a MTB ride in his forest at the time and they were pointing out repeated violations of environmental legislation that would have costs to remediate - which would directly eat into his profit.

Other side of the forest? Following the rules (doggedly, jobsworthy) because little profit motive.

That's how I see utilities tbh. (Like 30-40% of all our water is wasted because private companies have refused point blank to repair their pipes whilst profits roll out to shareholders). If you legislated to fix this, bills go up (because shareholders want their pound of flesh regardless - and if it was a loss making company they'd wind it up - an important mechanism you can't use with utilities.)

That means shareholder profits are being distributed not through value creation - but through simple skimming off the top of necessities.

It costs nothing (funding is via general taxation). This is in of itself environmentally problematic because there’s no financial incentive at the household level to control usage. There was an attempt a few years back to bring in water charges for exactly this reason and there was literally rioting in the streets (because some Taoiseach about thirty years ago promised there would never be water charges and the Irish will hold the State to that until the Sun turns nova because that’s how they roll), so the whole thing was abandoned.

The upshot is the water system is overstretched and underfunded (we’ve had two boil notices, days long at a time, in the last six weeks, that affected more than 10% of the entire population), and is certainly just as prone to questionable planning and environmental decisions as any private company, e.g. Major wastewater treatment plant gets go ahead in north Dublin despite local opposition
 

Scouse

Giant Thundercunt
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It costs nothing (funding is via general taxation)
So it costs something.

How much compared to private bills is the question?

This is in of itself environmentally problematic because there’s no financial incentive at the household level to control usage.

It's why I brought up 30-40% of our water being lost through broken pipes that aren't being repaired by priv.co.

Controlling usage and metering is a fucking joke when this is the actual situation.



upshot is the water system is overstretched and underfunded (we’ve had two boil notices, days long at a time, in the last six weeks, that affected more than 10% of the entire population), and is certainly just as prone to questionable planning and environmental decisions as any private company, e.g. Major wastewater treatment plant gets go ahead in north Dublin despite local opposition

The WW plant is nimbyism - looks to be in the right place for consumption.

The point of underfunding is political now - so something that can be done. Like our woefully underfunded private sector shitshow.

Literal 'shitshow' ;)
 

Gumbo

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No one seems to be pointing out the glaring fucktitude of the broadband plan.

Government taking control of rolling out fibre to every house in the land paid for by a tax on Google et al doesn't seem too stupid really.

What does seem really fucking stupid is why it would then be free to use.

Was water free when it was a nationalised industry? Was Electricity, Gas, the railways? You paid for all of them.

Do it by a special tax on Google, then make the upkeep of it paid for by people paying the bills, and move on to use that tax for something else useful.
 

Embattle

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Nothing is free, someone must pay for it somewhere.

Also do we really trust the government to run any more than it already does considering how bad it does with those it already runs more directly.
 

DaGaffer

Down With That Sorta Thing
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So it costs something.

How much compared to private bills is the question?



It's why I brought up 30-40% of our water being lost through broken pipes that aren't being repaired by priv.co.

Controlling usage and metering is a fucking joke when this is the actual situation.





The WW plant is nimbyism - looks to be in the right place for consumption.

The point of underfunding is political now - so something that can be done. Like our woefully underfunded private sector shitshow.

Literal 'shitshow' ;)

If you average the tax paying part of the population; we’re paying €12-€1500 each. Massive proportions of the income earning population (about 1m people out a total pop of 4.7m) don’t pay any income tax at all.

47% of water is lost through broken pipes, so worse than the UK.

That plant is nimbyism; but not the nimbyism you think; they’ve stuffed it into the corner of (working class) North Dublin, even though it serves (middle class) Fingal, but then it dumps an outflow into the only UNESCO biosphere on the planet that encompasses a capital city (Dublin Bay). They should have placed it further north (in North Fingal)or better yet built several smaller plants, but they can’t afford it and its politically more difficult.
 

Scouse

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If you average the tax paying part of the population; we’re paying €12-€1500 each. Massive proportions of the income earning population (about 1m people out a total pop of 4.7m) don’t pay any income tax at all.
How progressive!

So the people who really can't afford it don't pick up the bill.

What's the like-for-like comparison?

47% of water is lost through broken pipes, so worse than the UK.
So why are you harping on about usage campaigns being rejected when it's clearly not the problem there??

That plant is nimbyism; but not the nimbyism you think; they’ve stuffed it into the corner of (working class) North Dublin, even though it serves (middle class) Fingal, but then it dumps an outflow into the only UNESCO biosphere on the planet that encompasses a capital city (Dublin Bay). They should have placed it further north (in North Fingal)or better yet built several smaller plants, but they can’t afford it and its politically more difficult.
Multi-problems. Engineering solution.

You can treat water so it's cleaner than the rivers that feed into the sea. (IIRC from wastewater plant design back in the day - scale helps). Whatever engineering issue is the correct thing here is probably best - there's always a load of noise around this stuff and shit has to be treated somewhere (and the public always think they know better).

The above two questions are more important than this distraction (which would be the same, private or no).
 

DaGaffer

Down With That Sorta Thing
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How progressive!

So the people who really can't afford it don't pick up the bill.

What's the like-for-like comparison?

So why are you harping on about usage campaigns being rejected when it's clearly not the problem there??


Multi-problems. Engineering solution.

You can treat water so it's cleaner than the rivers that feed into the sea. (IIRC from wastewater plant design back in the day - scale helps). Whatever engineering issue is the correct thing here is probably best - there's always a load of noise around this stuff and shit has to be treated somewhere (and the public always think they know better).

The above two questions are more important than this distraction (which would be the same, private or no).

Usage campaigns might not be the big issue now, but they will be in the future, and if you’ve politically hamstrung yourself by taking consumption based pricing off the table for all time, that’s pretty fucking stupid.

Water will ultimately have to be priced based on consumption; the tax system is a blunt instrument for this type of service.
 

Scouse

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Water will ultimately have to be priced based on consumption
I dispute that fundamental assessment, but until the pipes and massive epic waste is fixed it's not even worth having that conversation.
 

Job

The Carl Pilkington of Freddyshouse
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Who the fuck drinks water

Out of a tap...jesus.
 

DaGaffer

Down With That Sorta Thing
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I dispute that fundamental assessment, but until the pipes and massive epic waste is fixed it's not even worth having that conversation.

LOL. Scratch a Green and you'll find a Red underneath, every time.
 

Job

The Carl Pilkington of Freddyshouse
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A nationalised broadband would be a fucking disaster for consumers.

I worked for BT when it was nationalised and everything ran at 10th speed, the consumer was right at the bottom, there was zero interest in modernisation..it was a nice club ran for the employees....pensions for everyone...everything was too much trouble....they actually demanded a doctors note off a guy with in an iron lung to put a longer extension on his phone so he could use the thing.


This from a Guard article on the site now.
Australia has attempted a part-nationalised model, though consumers still have to pay for the service and it has been criticised as a failure. Mark Gregory, a telecommunications expert at RMIT University, said Australia was “a third-world broadband country”. The costs rocketed from A$39.5bn in 2013 to A$51bn by 2018. There are record complaints and some customers do not get the minimum speeds promised.
 

Scouse

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LOL. Scratch a Green and you'll find a Red underneath, every time.
?? Don't get that.

I want to deal with a 50% waste problem before discussing hypothetical charging structures and suddenly I'm a commie?

Wow :(
 

dysfunction

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?? Don't get that.

I want to deal with a 50% waste problem before discussing hypothetical charging structures and suddenly I'm a commie?

Wow :(

You have to charge people for using water. How else do you fund the processing of it back to healthy drinking water again?

You could tax people more I guess. A special utilities tax perhaps. Another Poll Tax as that went down well last time.
 

Gwadien

Uneducated Northern Cretin
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You have to charge people for using water. How else do you fund the processing of it back to healthy drinking water again?

You could tax people more I guess. A special utilities tax perhaps. Another Poll Tax as that went down well last time.

Why can't they operate as a normal company and still charge people?

I think the point Scouse is making is more about the wastage and the incorrect priorities from utilities company for the betterment of our infrastructure as a whole.

In an ideal world, our Government would hold our utilities/rail/nationalisable companies to account to ensure that they are providing a good all round service.

As for free interwebs, Jesus, wouldn't the tech companies (That will pay for it) love to have 100% access of the UK's data?

I can't see why we can't just have the plan minus nationalisation; yo, BT, we'll give you funding (paid by tech firms) to roll out free internet to everyone.
 

dysfunction

FH is my second home
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Why can't they operate as a normal company and still charge people?

I think the point Scouse is making is more about the wastage and the incorrect priorities from utilities company for the betterment of our infrastructure as a whole.

In an ideal world, our Government would hold our utilities/rail/nationalisable companies to account to ensure that they are providing a good all round service.

As for free interwebs, Jesus, wouldn't the tech companies (That will pay for it) love to have 100% access of the UK's data?

I can't see why we can't just have the plan minus nationalisation; yo, BT, we'll give you funding (paid by tech firms) to roll out free internet to everyone.


Yes I agree that the private companies should be looking after the infrastructure to prevent wastage.
If they don't wish to do it then the government needs to introduce severe penalties for the waste. Enough for them to take notice not just to pay it and carry on wasting.

Another problem is there is 0 competition in the water utilities industry. I can't switch to a different supplier.
 

Gwadien

Uneducated Northern Cretin
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Yes I agree that the private companies should be looking after the infrastructure to prevent wastage.
If they don't wish to do it then the government needs to introduce severe penalties for the waste. Enough for them to take notice not just to pay it and carry on wasting.

Another problem is there is 0 competition in the water utilities industry. I can't switch to a different supplier.

That's the problem though with all 'nationalisable' companies, it's all good when there's competition, but when you don't have a choice to use a certain train/water supplier/postal service, it means that you can be taken for a ride when the Government doesn't give a fuck, which they haven't done for a very long time.

Unfortunately, Boris won't do anything about it.
 

Gumbo

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I think that a new national water leakage mending company should be created, and take fixing leaks out of the water companies hands.

It could be called H2O ClosedBreach.

They would fix infrastructure leaks and bill the water companies. The water companies can advise where they know of leaks, but they don't get to choose. Leaks can be reported directly to H2O ClosedBreach who will come and fix it whether the water company want them to or not. This is after a regulatory price cap is placed to protect the consumer. Obviously there will be a saving to the water companies as their leakage staff have been transferred to H2O ClosedBreach, but additional costs would have to be found from profits (sorry shareholders). It'll be a shorter term pain though as the costs of supply will inevitably go down as the leakage problems are lessened.

H2O ClosedBreach could also have a public arm where there is a subsidised service to those claiming benefits who have drippy taps/leaky loos to get that stuff fixed too which is a major culprit for waste.

H2O ClosedBreach could also have the monopoly for laying new mains to developments which would have to be paid for by the developers.

It's genius, I should be the first Chief Executive.

Thank you,

Goodnight.
 

Job

The Carl Pilkington of Freddyshouse
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The Guardian is pushing the notion that only Labour can even provide fibre for everyone.
Its being installed right now by BT.

Honestly though for 90% of home users..100mb is enough, I mean do you have to stream in 8K when it comes out, is cloud 4K video editing that important.

The real reason for speed us so they can monitor us in ever increasing detail...5G was built around the desire for millions of HD cameras and listening devices.
Your doorbell camera will be compulsary eventually...cameras in your car..on the trains...outside your house.
No trackers/cameras..no insurance.

If you removed all the tracking/ad/screen monitoring scripts from the internet you could surf on 100kbs.
Its literaly 95% of the code out there.
 

Gwadien

Uneducated Northern Cretin
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I dunno, I quite like downloading torrents quickly.
 

Job

The Carl Pilkington of Freddyshouse
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The two whitest christian and super low immigration areas of the whitest city in the country and the conservative candidates are

Wazz Maghul.
Tarsilo Onuluk

Wazz seems a top guy..dont know anything about Tarsilo..I think its an Italian name.
The previous con candidate was
2010 Sohail Qureshi
2005 Wafik Moustafa

Liverpool is so Labour that the Tories have to stick immigrants in now....theyre the only conservatives left.
 
Last edited:

dysfunction

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The two whitest christian and super low immigration areas of the whitest city in the country and the conservative candidates are

Wazz Maghul.
Tarsilo Onuluk

Wazz seems a top guy..dont know anything about Tarsilo..I think its an Italian name.
The previous con candidate was
2010 Sohail Qureshi
2005 Wafik Moustafa

Liverpool is so Labour that the Tories have to stick immigrants in now....theyre the only conservatives left.

I'm sure you just write stuff like this to get a reaction. Trolling is not a good trait.
 

Scouse

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I dunno if it's true or not @dysfunction - but my mum used to work in a cancer drug making factory on the Wirral which used to be regularly censured by it's head office because it didn't meet the target of 3.5% of the workforce being from ethnic minorities.

They had about 1.5% - which was more than three times the rate in the local population of less than 0.5% (back then anyway).

We had a single black kid in my school of 600 - was expelled after two terms for theiving. Nobody else got expelled that I can recall.

Moving to Bradford was a bit of a wake-up call for me :)
 

DaGaffer

Down With That Sorta Thing
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How progressive!

So the people who really can't afford it don't pick up the bill.

LOL. Scratch a Green and you'll find a Red underneath, every time.

You're more impressed by the (completely inadvertent btw) progressive payment model than arguments about why unfettered water consumption is bad. Red beats Green.

Yes, leakage should be fixed (although looking at country comparisons the UK is about average; the countries that are better all have much newer systems in place; e.g. countries that were bombed to shit in the War like Germany and had to replace everything, or places like Canada and Australia that only put piped water systems in over the last 60-70 years), but I see no evidence that a state owed water company would be any better at fixing the UK's leakage rates than the private sector, given the direct Irish example.
 

Scouse

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You're more impressed by the (completely inadvertent btw) progressive payment model than arguments about why unfettered water consumption is bad. Red beats Green.
I was taking the piss a little because of your taxpayer-only maths (and lack of weight to the argument that the poorest in england pay the same as the richest).

I, of course, am interested in consumption and when I'm not in Dublin I'll weigh in on that and its relationship to wastage, but in the meantime where should I go and not miss?
 

DaGaffer

Down With That Sorta Thing
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I was taking the piss a little because of your taxpayer-only maths (and lack of weight to the argument that the poorest in england pay the same as the richest).

I, of course, am interested in consumption and when I'm not in Dublin I'll weigh in on that and its relationship to wastage, but in the meantime where should I go and not miss?

You're in Dublin now? Well at least you've got a rare bit of nice weather. Guinness Storehouse is good (great view of the city from the top), bike ride around Phoenix Park and see the reindeer (bike hire place is by the entrance near Heuston Station), Brazan Head pub for a pint and a bit of fiddly-diddly music (nice food as well). Loads of museums and galleries etc. but this time of year...pub.
 

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