Chris

"It's not my duty as Mayor to make sure you have a parking spot. For me it's the same as if you bought a #cow, or a #refrigerator, and then asked me where you're going to put them. ' — Miguel Anxo Fernández Lores, Mayor of #pontevedra🇪🇸 (re-elected SIX times)

Treasury targeting inheritance tax reforms to help plug UK deficit Exclusive: Chancellor also looking at tweaks to capital gains tax to try to bridge £40bn-plus spending gap before budget

It won’t happen, and given the political backlash against net zero it would spark it probably shouldn’t happen, but if the Treasury really wants to raise money it is mad that fuel duty remains frozen.
www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

BBC Radio 4's hourly news headlines today have been an unrelenting Two Minutes' Hate against immigrants. The UK's national broadcaster is deliberately fomenting hatred against some of the world's most vulnerable people, while license fee payers pick up the tab.

🤔

To clarify, that is a mobile speed camera that visits every few months, despite the obvious need for more enforcement. Crazy...

97% of the drivers on my road are criminals, breaking the 20mph speed limit (speed camera stat). Mine is recognised as a particularly bad example in Cardiff - no resources for more enforcement! 🤷‍♂️ However, when I'm driving along it at 20 those behind me are too ...

Does the average Joe not have a pension?

It's working. Now if we could only have enforcement, preferably with mandatory speed limiters, it would work better.

It does make a difference without enforcement. It would be much better again with enforcement.

Dear Britain, it’s now clear: 20mph zones save lives and don’t slow traffic. Implement them | Sadiq Khan There is too much bluff and bluster on this subject. Ordinary people just want safe streets for themselves and those they love, and we can achieve that, says London mayor Sadiq Khan

Dear Britain, it’s now clear: 20mph zones save lives & don’t slow traffic. Implement them.— @sadiqkhanlondon.bsky.social.

“Despite what detractors might claim, 20mph speed limits haven’t actually made journeys slower because journey times are largely dictated by junction delays, not vehicle speed.”

We need the mass roll out of mandatory speed limiters too

Dear Britain, it’s now clear: 20mph zones save lives and don’t slow traffic. Implement them | Sadiq Khan There is too much bluff and bluster on this subject. Ordinary people just want safe streets for themselves and those they love, and we can achieve that, says London mayor Sadiq Khan

Good piece here from Sadiq Kahn urging the mass rollout of 20mph zones.
It should be the default limit in built up areas with higher limits by exception.
www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

This is *immensely* stupid advice. They don’t use energy while they’re sitting on a hard drive not being accessed. They very much use energy while you’re going through them all and deleting them.

It’s also a fraction of a fraction of the energy saving you’d make by driving less or similar.

Cincinnati Open: Arthur Rinderknech collapses on court in hot conditions Arthur Rinderknech collapses on court in sweltering conditions during his Cincinnati Open match with Felix Auger-Aliassime, before retiring.

Extreme heat increasingly hitting tennis players, its as if it just 'happens' in a sport sponsored by fossil fuel companies, polluting airlines and SUV makers, in this piece with no mention of the word 'climate'...

'Rinderknech collapses on court in Cincinnati heat - www.bbc.com/sport/tennis...

Rachel Reeves needs to put up taxes to cover £40bn deficit, thinktank says NIESR suggests a rise of 5p in the pound on basic and higher rate of income tax would fill the budget gap

There is a £40bn tax hole and govt must hike taxes, say headlines.

None said that HMRC didn't collect £46.8bn last yr. 40% (£18.6bn) relates to corporations. £500bn since 2010.

NAO says wealthy are dodging taxes. Corporations shift profits to dodge taxes.

Why hit the little people?

As we watch Keir Starmer and his team expand NHS privatisation, please remember that he was elected to become Labour leader saying specifically that he would remove NHS private outsourcing. He then quietly dropped this pledge in Summer 2022.

This isn’t OK 🚨

RFK Jr. in interview with Scripps News: ‘Trusting the experts is not science’ HHS Secretary RFK Jr. sat down with Scripps News for a wide-ranging interview, discussing mRNA vaccine funding policy changes and a recent shooting at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

1. "'Trusting the experts is not a feature of either a science or democracy," Kennedy said."

It's literally a vital feature of both science and of representative democracy.

I've written a fair bit about trust in expertise as a vital mechanism in the collective epistemology of science.

This is a man who has no idea what he's talking about, & no understanding of his interlocutor's motivation, about to sell out Ukraine to Putin, who knows exactly how to manipulate Trump. Europe cannot let this stand, if it wants to save itself as well as Ukraine.

No plans to change passenger rules for new young drivers a 'major oversight', AA says Government plans to overhaul driving laws do not include graduated licences for new drivers, despite calls for their introduction.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article... Where's the ambition to address the UK's killer driver problem?

I mean, perhaps the data indicates they're the worst but most drivers fail when it comes to risk judgement given the numbers who break the law. Would it be possible to do something about them too, perhaps?

Our government - doing the bare minimum on road safety / road crime, doing stuff that should have been done decades ago. Why do we allow cars on our roads that can exceed the applicable speed limit? Why do we allow killer drivers to drive again? Etc etc.

If you want to bring back the feeling of old Twitter, just bring up the topic of limiting the speed of cars in cities to the masses. Reply-guys will come pouring out of the woodwork. 😂

Of course, they can't allow themselves to mention the best thing they've done recently (20s), in part because the implementation of that was flawed, despite the obvious beneficial societal outcomes. Not to mention the poor comms.

A year of Eluned Plus some rather sneaky Tories...

Good piece on Welsh Labour: "When I asked the First Minister about how Welsh Labour had improved Wales during their 25 years in office she pointed to free prescriptions - a policy introduced 18 years ago. When your key selling point is in itself old enough to vote in the election you have a problem"

Compare and contrast how the government treats these protesters vs. the ones trying to burn asylum seekers to death in their beds

The government continues to do the bare minimum when it comes to road safety and road crime. Tinkering at the edges when real change is so obviously needed.

Graphic showing a 9 m wide track for metros can move as many people as a 175 m road for cars.

To carry 50,000 people per hour in each direction, a city needs a 175m wide road for cars.

Even if those cars are electric.

And then there’s all the parking.

OR a city can move A LOT MORE people in a lot less space, with A LOT LESS public money, emissions, pollution, noise etc.

Choices.

Simple.

Why do we enable road crime by failing to apply such obviously correct logic? Killer madness baked into our society. #motonormativity

Please tell me why it's perfectly legal to buy a car that's capable of 140+ mph speeds, and legally drive it on public roads, when the motorway speed limit is 70 mph?
Why are cars not legally limited to 70 mph?

Good to know what daughter's school mates are up to nowadays ...