Prices of the electricity we use to charge

soundwave

Esteemed Pedelecer
May 23, 2015
16,996
6,536
you watch the council will ban you from growing ur own food soon n be round with a concreate mixer :oops:
 
  • Like
Reactions: MikelBikel

flecc

Member
Oct 25, 2006
53,260
30,648
Did you know that the Nordic nations (Sweden and Norway) are sending out civil defence pamphlets warning the population to lay in a month's supply of necessities?

I have kept a month's worth of food in house since the Russian invasion of Ukraine and also a longer term food store of 30 kilos of wheat and a hand grinder. In the current instability - especially since permission to use ATACAMs on Russian territory, I suspect that most people in the UK have NO IDEA how vulnerable the just in time food delivery system is. Can you recall how the supermarkets emptied at the beginning of covid?

If things got a bit awkward with the Russians - the shelves would be empty in two days.


Having had the experience of living through WW2 and the consequent rationing and shortages, I have always had large reserves of stored food at home. I've also got plenty of emergency lighting, cooking and heating equipment.

I'm still amused about the reaction of neighbours when we suffered some series of power cuts, both in the early 1970s and the 1980s, one lasting nearly two days. It baffled them that my flat was well lit at night and emanating live television programs! They were all very grateful though when their homes were abruptly plunged into total darkness and I turned up at their doors, handing them candles and matches.

There's a very silly development in plumbing now that has spread here that you may not be aware of. It's replumbing flats and houses with no hot or cold water tanks, just relying on the pressurised mains and instantaneous on demand water heating. Of course this means one is totally reliant on the water and electricity company supplies and cannot even flush toilets if the water supply is cut off. Even more so where a macerating toilet is fitted.

And worst of all, those supplies of dried pasta, rice and flour etcetera that we've laid down cannot be used without any stored water.

Bonkers.
.
 
Last edited:

soundwave

Esteemed Pedelecer
May 23, 2015
16,996
6,536
the council point blank refused to fit a mixer unit to my gas combi boiler to heat the hot water and fitted a 9.5 fk kw electric $hit shower.

i even offered to pay for it nope!

it is clear they want rid of gas and have everything on electric cant even fit a log burning stove to a council house because of health and safety.

17 falty knackerd inverts up the road trying to explode is fine tho as last 25 years and dont even need checking :rolleyes:
 
  • Like
Reactions: MikelBikel

AndyBike

Esteemed Pedelecer
Nov 8, 2020
1,429
618
Another right wing yt channel that pushed brexit, which has cost the UK £100 billion in lost income.

The farmers share the blame for that with 66% of them voting for brexit.

Besides any business should pay inheritance tax, just like the rest of us and especially ones that are valued at £3m

Do you see the telegraph, the daily mail, gb news coming forward to fight for some south Asian business owner so he is exempt from taxation when passing the business down to his kids ?

The truth is these media giants, whom are owned by billionaires do not give a crap about small businesses or small farms, their concern is primarily to do with land owners who bought the land not to produce food but as a method of tax avoidance.
Like James Dyson. Top brexit promoter, bought land to avoid tax, and post brexit took his company to the EU
Or Jacob Rees Mogg, another brexit exponent, whom after getting brexit tok his £70m investments out the UK
Richard Tice. made millions off brexit.

I dont understand why people listen to these thieves, after all they couldnt give a rats about the common man, or the smaller farmer for that matter. Their allegiance is to their own ilk and their own pocket.

Farage,Tice Mogg and others want all social security to be gone, for the nhs to be private, because it would save them 2% or 3% off their tax bill
 

soundwave

Esteemed Pedelecer
May 23, 2015
16,996
6,536
only the stupid ppl pay tax that cant afford the legal advise to get round it like a off shore bank account.:cool:

i put in the right to buy and they want to see whats in my ass even cash shoved up it from everyone living here :oops:

cant borrow money from family as unsecured loan or will need a loan agreement setup with interest or must be given as a gift and declared as such via solicitor letter.

fkn 1800 quid for conveyancing solicitor that does what??? i cant just go to the bank get the cash and dump it at reception at there corrupt corporation because there not able to even count cash anymore ;)

wonder how many bags of 5ps you will need for 60 grand :p
 

Ghost1951

Esteemed Pedelecer
Jun 2, 2024
1,659
679
I dont understand why people listen to these thieves, after all they couldnt give a rats about the common man, or the smaller farmer for that matter. Their allegiance is to their own ilk and their own pocket.

Farage,Tice Mogg and others want all social security to be gone, for the nhs to be private, because it would save them 2% or 3% off their tax bill
You ought to know that the much vaunted NHS is one of the worst performing health service in Europe - FAR below others which receive broadly similar proportions of the GDP of their nations in funding. The NHS has more money than it has ever had and is almost at the highest level of GDP it has ever had in funding - only bettered during the covid pandemic. Yet in spite of the vast sums of money - about £180 Billion, a great many people can not see a GP and will be fobbed off with a nurse or a pharmacist instead.

The cost of the NHS has increased 500% in real terms (accounting for inflation) over the last 50 years.


Waiting lists are longer than ever before. It isn't the money - it is the service and the organisation.
Just ask Flecc about his experience.

60891

We are bang in the middle of the European average for funding as a proportion of GDP and down with the dregs like Montenegro and Bosnia in the outcomes table.

We have stupidly sanctified the bloody thing and the left go bonkers at any idea of change. It is noticeable that Streeting has said it isn't the money and it needs to change. The eminent medical professor, Sir John Bell has said so too, and blames the medical profession.


In Europe the most successful medical systems are part insurance funded and part state funded and they work extremely efficiently and deliver great outcomes. Any time the subject is brought up among left minded people here - such as yourself - they usually start jumping around like gibbons and shouting about the hideous American system. THAT IS NOT IN ANY WAY TYPICAL of insurance based European systems.

Look how far down the rankings in Europe our health care system is:

 
Last edited:
  • Agree
Reactions: flecc

soundwave

Esteemed Pedelecer
May 23, 2015
16,996
6,536
my m8 works at the hospital as a porter and has to go private to get his feet sorted out atm it is a absolute $hit hole no one gives a crap like 95% of the staff and doctors its not fit for purpose.

over 65 it is a death centre they will put food in front of you and if you cant feed urself and no one can visit you to help you they dont care.

id recommend going to the vets out of warranty ;)
 

Peter.Bridge

Esteemed Pedelecer
Apr 19, 2023
1,328
609
proportions of the GDP of their nations in funding
Why Is it only US funded think tanks (with sponsors that want to cash in on breaking up the NHS) and their tame "journalists" at the telegraph and spectator that compare health systems as proportion of GDP , I wonder ? It's conflating 2 things, why is our GDP so poor and how is our health service doing against international comparisons.Screenshot_20241119-064819.png
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: flecc

Woosh

Trade Member
May 19, 2012
20,447
16,915
Southend on Sea
wooshbikes.co.uk
At present, we do have an unofficial two tier health system. If you can pay for your treatment, you'll go to the bottom of the queue because most often, your condition is not life threatening. You'll then be told gently and repeatedly that there is the private option. That's de facto the case with dental treatments for example. I have a friend who got one knee replaced privately and the other knee on the NHS by the same surgeon.
I reckon we're already incentivised to adopt a healthier lifestyle. The next step is for the NHS to introduce co-payments.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Ghost1951

Ghost1951

Esteemed Pedelecer
Jun 2, 2024
1,659
679
Peter.Bridge said:
Why Is it only US funded think tanks (with sponsors that want to cash in on breaking up the NHS) and their tame "journalists" at the telegraph and spectator that compare health systems as proportion of GDP , I wonder ?
It isn't even true that 'only' US funded sources criticise the performance of the NHS and its gargantuan structure?

Is Wes Streeting a US agent, or Prof Sir John Bell. These are but two voices saying that the problem is not money.

Why not address the criticisms and suggestions rather than dismissing sources out of hand. You suggest that journalists who are right of centre have no business commenting, or at least ought not to be taken seriously. This is not what I would expect of someone who wanted to know what is happening. I am certainly right of centre, but I read and think about perspectives expressed in the Guardian almost every day.

Below is a table showing the health expenditure of European countries, and as I said, the UK spend is bang in the middle of the field. YOUR table only dealt with some of the nations, and had picked them, perhaps to make a point so that the UK was not in the middle - only because some data was left out.... That's a rather dodgy way to handle data - smacks of an attitude of 'Lets make the UK look bad. We can leave out a chunk of countries to make the UK look like it under spends on health. I know you are not responsible for the design of the chart, but you did post it.

The UK is not at the top. I didn't say it was. I said it was in the middle.

This graph shows the average GDP per capita spending on health between 2010 and 2019 so it is a little out of date. The UK's spending is now much higher standing at 10.9% in 2023 - so bear that in mind. Current spending is a full 2.6% higher than this chart shows. I don't know how the otehr nations's spending may have changed.

Even so - UK health spend 2010 to 2019 is about the European average.

60898


Now lets look at outcomes.

Ireland in that period spent a smaller percentage of its GDP on health than the UK. It has a co pay system. You pay to see the GP and you pay to turn up at the equivalent of Accident and Emergency. From memory, I think Irish people are charged about 25 Euros for a GP consutation and 100 Euros for one at A&E. Ireland is six places to thee right of the UK on the chart above, spending only 6.8% of GDP on health against the UK's 8.3%. (or in 2023 10.9%). However, Ireland's service has far better outcomes than the NHS. Irish people live longer and are much more likely to survive serious illness.

Irish people have twice the number of MRI scanners or CT scanner per million people than the UK does, in spite of spending a lot less as a percentage of GDP.

The UK has fewer doctors per capita than Ireland, 3 per thousand UK, 3.5 per thousand Ireleand.

60901

The UK has greater avoidable mortality than many nations, driven by lower survival rates for many cancers.

As a man with a eye for detail, you will notice that countries who spend similar GDP on health are doing much better than we are in cancer survival rates, Spain for example and Italy.

60900


You are concerned at the use of GDP per capita as a measure of spending, but most of the data available uses that measure because it shows what the country can afford to spend, I suppose. And something which jumps out at me by the by is that the USA which spends vastly more than we do on every measure does VERY much worse than all of the European systems - probably because of the rates of obesity, diabetes and inactivity in the population. That's a wild guess, but perhaps not too far from the mark.

You also mention the question of why the UK's GDP per capita is so low, but that though an interesting question is not really a health one, is it?

I suppose having about 21.9% of the working age population sitting at home (while recruiters say there is a shortage of labour) may be the key factor there. How do we sort that one out? I'd say make sure you don't hand out free money to the idle and unambitious, but others may not agree.
 

Attachments

Last edited:

Woosh

Trade Member
May 19, 2012
20,447
16,915
Southend on Sea
wooshbikes.co.uk
Clarkson? What's he got to do with it?
Mr Clarkson told The Sun: “I will be there, despite having letters from doctors telling me not to go on the march and saying I must avoid stress.” The Cotswolds farm owner added: “We have got two coaches of farmers from around here who are leaving from Diddly Squat. It is a hugely important issue.”
Over a decade ago Mr Clarkson said there were "many sensible reasons" for why he bought a farm, including that the "government doesn’t get any of my money when I die".

So why shouldn't a large farm be considered like any other family business? What special about it? It's not like the heirs could not sell the farm and cash in tax free if they don't like farming. Rachel Reeves removed the anomaly of concessions given to the 'landed gentry' and gentleman farming'.
Look at how inequality persists through generations. If like Trump, your mum and dad gave you private schooling, then left you a few hundreds millions. Unlike other entrepreneurs, you could start right away playing a long game and enjoy statistically a much better chance of success.
Inheritance tax is one of the only few tools governments have left to reduce inequality.
 
Last edited:

flecc

Member
Oct 25, 2006
53,260
30,648
I reckon we're already incentivised to adopt a healthier lifestyle. The next step is for the NHS to introduce co-payments.
Trouble with a healthy lifestyle is that one just gets older before getting the same major problems. I lived a very healthy lifestyle until 2007 almost entirely free of health problems, but then had a heart attack at 70 due to an inherited condition from my mother.

I got through that ok with no treatment offered by the NHS and it was another four years before anything else occurred:

That was an inguinal hernia operation in 2011.

Then the left cataract operation in 2012.

Then the right cataract operation in 2013

Then a colonoscopy in 2014, followed the same year by a ligasure haemorrhoidectomy.

Then from 2014 onwards my heart problems returned to haunt me, gradually worsening through to as many as 132 tachycardia heart attacks between last September and this one.

Those have stopped at present thank goodness, but only to be replaced in September with another hernia, a different type this time. It took over three weeks to get a doctor's appointment for diagnosis and be told I must have a scan before the operation to repair it.

I'm on the waiting list for that now and have learnt that with any luck I might get the scan in December. Trouble is that it's been announced that it is taking 13.5 weeks for scan results to come through, seemingly a lack people able to read them.

So by about April next year they might arrive, but then I'll be joining the waiting list for the repair operation, that maybe by September. A year of living with a hernia that gets very painful as I go through each day and which could rupture at any time and turn into an emergency.

That's my summary of healthy living and the chain of problems that still follow once its benefits have finished in old age. Maybe after that heart attack at 70 I should have taken up base jumping or coasteering to avoid the later troubles.
.
 
Last edited:
  • Informative
Reactions: Woosh

Ghost1951

Esteemed Pedelecer
Jun 2, 2024
1,659
679
I'm just thinking about the point I made above about survival rates.

It is noticeable that the USA has terrible survival rates and so do we. What do we both have in common which the other European countries have less of?

Woosh mentions it above - unhealthy life-style, and in particular obesity with its myriad of co-morbidities. The UK population, and more so the American one, are vastly too fat.
 

Ghost1951

Esteemed Pedelecer
Jun 2, 2024
1,659
679
Mr Clarkson told The Sun: “I will be there, despite having letters from doctors telling me not to go on the march and saying I must avoid stress.” The Cotswolds farm owner added: “We have got two coaches of farmers from around here who are leaving from Diddly Squat. It is a hugely important issue.”
Over a decade ago Mr Clarkson said there were "many sensible reasons" for why he bought a farm, including that the "government doesn’t get any of my money when I die".

So why shouldn't a large farm be considered like any other family business? What special about it? It's not like the heirs could not sell the farm and cash in tax free if they don't like farming.
Look at how inequality persists through generations. If like Trump, your mum and dad gave you private schooling, then left you a few hundreds millions. Unlike other entrepreneurs, you could start right away playing a long game and enjoy statistically a much better chance of success.
Inheritance tax is one of the only few tools governments have left to reduce inequality.
Of course, Clarkeson's mother paid for his private education by making the Paddington Bear toys that you may remember. My memory tells me she started out making them at the kitchen table by hand, and when they caught on, she had them made in a factory. They were so successful that the family made millions.

It would be a vast mistake (and this one is particularly rife among the left thinkers) to ignore the manifest differences in cognitive ability and the culture of different classes. There is also a very strong genetic component in intelligence (the left denies it, but it is a FACT). Bright people on average have brighter children on average. Bright people get on better in the work place on average, so you would expect that this passes on through families. Then there is the cultural capital which families pass on. Good work ethic, the passing on of a sense that education is of value - all of this lead to what Woosh is suggesting is a privilege of money.
 
Last edited:

Peter.Bridge

Esteemed Pedelecer
Apr 19, 2023
1,328
609
It isn't even true that 'only' US funded sources criticise the performance of the NHS and its gargantuan structure?

Is Wes Streeting a US agent, or Prof Sir John Bell. These are but two voices saying that the problem is not money.

Why not address the criticisms and suggestions rather than dismissing sources out of hand. You suggest that journalists who are right of centre have no business commenting, or at least ought not to be taken seriously. This is not what I would expect of someone who wanted to know what is happening. I am certainly right of centre, but I read and think about perspectives expressed in the Guardian almost every day.

Below is a table showing the health expenditure of European countries, and as I said, the UK spend is bang in the middle of the field. YOUR table only dealt with some of the nations, and had picked them, perhaps to make a point so that the UK was not in the middle - only because some data was left out.... That's a rather dodgy way to handle data - smacks of an attitude of 'Lets make the UK look bad. We can leave out a chunk of countries to make the UK look like it under spends on health. I know you are not responsible for the design of the chart, but you did post it.

The UK is not at the top. I didn't say it was. I said it was in the middle.

This graph shows the average GDP per capita spending on health between 2010 and 2019 so it is a little out of date. The UK's spending is now much higher standing at 10.9% in 2023 - so bear that in mind. Current spending is a full 2.6% higher than this chart shows. I don't know how the otehr nations's spending may have changed.

Even so - UK health spend 2010 to 2019 is about the European average.

View attachment 60898


Now lets look at outcomes.

Ireland in that period spent a smaller percentage of its GDP on health than the UK. It has a co pay system. You pay to see the GP and you pay to turn up at the equivalent of Accident and Emergency. From memory, I think Irish people are charged about 25 Euros for a GP consutation and 100 Euros for one at A&E. Ireland is six places to thee right of the UK on the chart above, spending only 6.8% of GDP on health against the UK's 8.3%. (or in 2023 10.9%). However, Ireland's service has far better outcomes than the NHS. Irish people live longer and are much more likely to survive serious illness.

Irish people have twice the number of MRI scanners or CT scanner per million people than the UK does, in spite of spending a lot less as a percentage of GDP.

The UK has fewer doctors per capita than Ireland, 3 per thousand UK, 3.5 per thousand Ireleand.

View attachment 60901

The UK has greater avoidable mortality than many nations, driven by lower survival rates for many cancers.

As a man with a eye for detail, you will notice that countries who spend similar GDP on health are doing much better than we are in cancer survival rates, Spain for example and Italy.

View attachment 60900


You are concerned at the use of GDP per capita as a measure of spending, but most of the data available uses that measure because it shows what the country can afford to spend, I suppose. And something which jumps out at me by the by is that the USA which spends vastly more than we do on every measure does VERY much worse than all of the European systems - probably because of the rates of obesity, diabetes and inactivity in the population. That's a wild guess, but perhaps not too far from the mark.

You also mention the question of why the UK's GDP per capita is so low, but that though an interesting question is not really a health one, is it?

I suppose having about 21.9% of the working age population sitting at home (while recruiters say there is a shortage of labour) may be the key factor there. How do we sort that one out? I'd say make sure you don't hand out free money to the idle and unambitious, but others may not agree.
Ireland spends more than the UK per capita

The Kings Fund ( which isn't sponsored by dodgy US money ) has a very good summary of research on international healthcare comparisons , including the graph you included.

It fundamentally disagrees with the Tufton Street line that is parroted by Telegraph and Spectator columnists



  • "There is little evidence that one particular ‘type’ of health care system or model of health care funding produces systematically better results than another. Countries predominantly try to achieve better health outcomes by improving their existing model of health care, rather than by adopting a radically different model."
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: AndyBike

AndyBike

Esteemed Pedelecer
Nov 8, 2020
1,429
618
Sorry Peter, I was just replying to Ghost. Hadnt noticed your post

You ought to know that the much vaunted NHS is one of the worst performing health service in Europe - FAR below others which receive broadly similar proportions of the GDP of their nations in funding. The NHS has more money than it has ever had and is almost at the highest level of GDP it has ever had in funding - only bettered during the covid pandemic. Yet in spite of the vast sums of money - about £180 Billion, a great many people can not see a GP and will be fobbed off with a nurse or a pharmacist instead.

The cost of the NHS has increased 500% in real terms (accounting for inflation) over the last 50 years.


Waiting lists are longer than ever before. It isn't the money - it is the service and the organisation.
Just ask Flecc about his experience.

View attachment 60891

We are bang in the middle of the European average for funding as a proportion of GDP and down with the dregs like Montenegro and Bosnia in the outcomes table.

We have stupidly sanctified the bloody thing and the left go bonkers at any idea of change. It is noticeable that Streeting has said it isn't the money and it needs to change. The eminent medical professor, Sir John Bell has said so too, and blames the medical profession.


In Europe the most successful medical systems are part insurance funded and part state funded and they work extremely efficiently and deliver great outcomes. Any time the subject is brought up among left minded people here - such as yourself - they usually start jumping around like gibbons and shouting about the hideous American system. THAT IS NOT IN ANY WAY TYPICAL of insurance based European systems.

Look how far down the rankings in Europe our health care system is:

Im not sure the data can be taken as an absolute, given the last 14 years of under investment, but overall it is still a good service, and with proper investment can do better

the UK does better than comparable countries in some areas, and worse in others. There is little evidence that one individual country or model of health care system performs better than another across the board. Countries improve health care for their populations mainly by reforming their existing model of health care rather than adopting an alternative. Rather than unwinding the NHS, we should seek to improve it, and there is a lot to learn from other countries when doing so.
 

Ghost1951

Esteemed Pedelecer
Jun 2, 2024
1,659
679
Mr Clarkson told The Sun: “I will be there, despite having letters from doctors telling me not to go on the march and saying I must avoid stress.” The Cotswolds farm owner added: “We have got two coaches of farmers from around here who are leaving from Diddly Squat. It is a hugely important issue.”
Over a decade ago Mr Clarkson said there were "many sensible reasons" for why he bought a farm, including that the "government doesn’t get any of my money when I die".

If like Trump, your mum and dad gave you private schooling, then left you a few hundreds millions. Unlike other entrepreneurs, you could start right away playing a long game and enjoy statistically a much better chance of success.
Inheritance tax is one of the only few tools governments have left to reduce inequality.
Just to emphasise the difference between Clarkson's family background and the likes of Trump.

Clarkson's parents were a teacher and a travelling salesman. They made money sufficient to send their kids to private school and to buy a nice house on the back of a rather clever idea of his mother, who made Paddington bear stuffed toys for Jeremy and his sister for Christmas and they were so good, she was soon fully employed in making more of them at her kitchen table, ultimately outsourcing their manufacture and making quite a bit of money.

Clarkson himself started out in employment as a journalist at a local newspaper in Yorkshire and the rest you know.

Personally, although not wealthy or talented myself, I delight in a story of success like that. I have at times found Clarkson puerile and annoying, and I especially felt annoyed with him in the 1980s when he rubbished and mocked the car I owned (don't ask which) but it is undeniable that his family were ordinary and strapped for cash, but were clever and invested heavily in their children's education. Clarkson thereafter made his OWN way in the world and used his personality and talent to become a wealthy man.

What's wrong with that?