Current situation.

[harkom]

Well now, ahem.. the current energy/economic/political crisis seems to have resulted in a deafening silence from Greta & Co. Am I correct to  think that this highlights how submissive elected "government" have become to minority activists who blare their message on social media. Perhaps correct.... but I can only conclude that to achieve their impact on "current government" policy they are aided and abetted by a willing accomplice in the media + civil "service" aka Blob, aka The Swamp.

So this has brought home to me just how ill-conceived UK policy has become to rely on - importation of Food,- Energy,-  manufactured goods (China...and a few smaller players), and  rely on The City and financial institutions to be the principle wealth generator. Add in the the long standing depletion of funding for the UK armed forces to subsidise the flagrant waste of UK reserves on .... well the list just goes on'n on'n on...

[Vince Green]

12 minutes ago, harkom said:

Well now, ahem.. the current energy/economic/political crisis seems to have resulted in a deafening silence from Greta & Co. Am I correct to  think that this highlights how submissive elected "government" have become to minority activists who blare their message on social media. Perhaps correct.... but I can only conclude that to achieve their impact on "current government" policy they are aided and abetted by a willing accomplice in the media + civil "service" aka Blob, aka The Swamp.

So this has brought home to me just how ill-conceived UK policy has become to rely on - importation of Food,- Energy,-  manufactured goods (China...and a few smaller players), and  rely on The City and financial institutions to be the principle wealth generator. Add in the the long standing depletion of funding for the UK armed forces to subsidise the flagrant waste of UK reserves on .... well the list just goes on'n on'n on...

Do you know?

that is the most incomprehensible load of "guff" i have ever read on this forum .

The second paragraph gets a bit  better but if you have a point to make I suggest you try English as thats the language most of us speak most of the time. Your post is incomprehensible and ******** just goes into the bin  

Try and state your case in simple terms so we can understand and interact Not wanting to be negative at all

Greta is a multi Millionaire  who charges thousands of Euros to give interviews or appear on TV. Not one of us I think?

Dont want to disrespect you but you went over our heads 

[Mungler]

This is stolen from elsewhere and touches on what the OP is getting at:

 

“I wonder how academic all this is actually going to turn out to be? Given that the end of civilization is generally regarded as 4 meals away, the cost of energy has risen through the stratosphere (and is still going) but there is still no sense of facing reality, and life here goes on as if nothing has happened. EVERYTHING is going to get ruinously more costly. Suddenly.

Water doesn't arrive in your taps by gravity.  The content of your drains  doesn't pump itself to the treatment works by gravity.

We are going to forced to prioritise as never before. We are all going to question the value and need for much of the fluff and trivia of modern life that has been involved in creating a veneer of civilization. Luxury or necessity?

Where are savings coming from when faced with paying a non-optional extra £500 a month for energy related costs? Eating out - holidays and vacations.... Who is going to continue to pay £3 for a cup of coffee that you can make for less than 30p? 

It's going to be grim! Parents will have a lot of quite complex but necesary explaining to do.

We could start by getting all the politicians responsible for the obviously catastrophic energy strategy of the last 30 years, and forcing them to pedal generators until they drop. 

If we are to begin to get a grip on this, there will have to be plans for martial law well advanced, since the population is going to need to be contained in ways that will make covid look like crowd control for a vicarage tea party.

The police service (not force) appears to be a curious combination of social workers more worried by pronouns and tweets then it is by traditional law and order, and squads of almost synonymous thugs in boiler suits and helmets, stuffed  in the back of transit vans and lead by an inept and confused hierarchy that was infiltrated and politicised during the disastrous Blair junta years that eradicated all common sense. Neither of these two facets of modern British policing is the slightest bit interested in protection of property and catching real criminals. They will happily issue a fine to a motorist for not wearing a seatbelt trapped by camera, but they don't appear to give a monkeys about reports of criminal damage or break ins any longer.

Set against this brutal, stark and sudden new dystopian reality, the obsession of our swamp "blob" parliament with partygate is surreal. Fussing about the Northern Ireland Protocol is the an onanistic indulgence from a bygone age - insane, indulgent nonsense of a worthless bureaucracy that is rapidly becoming irrelevant.”

 

 

[Mr grumpy]

7 hours ago, Vince Green said:

Do you know?

that is the most incomprehensible load of "guff" i have ever read on this forum .

The second paragraph gets a bit  better but if you have a point to make I suggest you try English as thats the language most of us speak most of the time. Your post is incomprehensible and ******** just goes into the bin  

Try and state your case in simple terms so we can understand and interact Not wanting to be negative at all

Greta is a multi Millionaire  who charges thousands of Euros to give interviews or appear on TV. Not one of us I think?

Dont want to disrespect you but you went over our heads 

Correct 👍

[B725]

The OP is right far too much reliance on foreign part's and the so called MPs that decide what us mere mortals should do cannot see beyond today with virtually no back up. If what's happening now in the world doesn't wake them up then god help us.

[Rob85]

Depletion of funding for the armed forces? We have 2 brand new aircraft carriers, a brand new fleet of state of the art fighter aircraft and another home grown one in development, new drone system to go in tandem with it under development that the company I work for is submitting a bid for. Upgrading the already world class challenger 2 MBT, these are just projects I can think of off the top of my head.

Apart from downsizing some of the military I think technologically we aren't doing too bad. Remember a lot of the stuff that was gotten rid of was well past its use by date.

[discobob]

2 hours ago, Mungler said:

They will happily issue a fine to a motorist for not wearing a seatbelt trapped by camera, but they don't appear to give a monkeys about reports of criminal damage or break ins any longer

One brings in money with no effort - the others costs money with effort!

[old man]

10 hours ago, Mungler said:

This is stolen from elsewhere and touches on what the OP is getting at:

 

“I wonder how academic all this is actually going to turn out to be? Given that the end of civilization is generally regarded as 4 meals away, the cost of energy has risen through the stratosphere (and is still going) but there is still no sense of facing reality, and life here goes on as if nothing has happened. EVERYTHING is going to get ruinously more costly. Suddenly.

Water doesn't arrive in your taps by gravity.  The content of your drains  doesn't pump itself to the treatment works by gravity.

We are going to forced to prioritise as never before. We are all going to question the value and need for much of the fluff and trivia of modern life that has been involved in creating a veneer of civilization. Luxury or necessity?

Where are savings coming from when faced with paying a non-optional extra £500 a month for energy related costs? Eating out - holidays and vacations.... Who is going to continue to pay £3 for a cup of coffee that you can make for less than 30p? 

It's going to be grim! Parents will have a lot of quite complex but necesary explaining to do.

We could start by getting all the politicians responsible for the obviously catastrophic energy strategy of the last 30 years, and forcing them to pedal generators until they drop. 

If we are to begin to get a grip on this, there will have to be plans for martial law well advanced, since the population is going to need to be contained in ways that will make covid look like crowd control for a vicarage tea party.

The police service (not force) appears to be a curious combination of social workers more worried by pronouns and tweets then it is by traditional law and order, and squads of almost synonymous thugs in boiler suits and helmets, stuffed  in the back of transit vans and lead by an inept and confused hierarchy that was infiltrated and politicised during the disastrous Blair junta years that eradicated all common sense. Neither of these two facets of modern British policing is the slightest bit interested in protection of property and catching real criminals. They will happily issue a fine to a motorist for not wearing a seatbelt trapped by camera, but they don't appear to give a monkeys about reports of criminal damage or break ins any longer.

Set against this brutal, stark and sudden new dystopian reality, the obsession of our swamp "blob" parliament with partygate is surreal. Fussing about the Northern Ireland Protocol is the an onanistic indulgence from a bygone age - insane, indulgent nonsense of a worthless bureaucracy that is rapidly becoming irrelevant.”

 

 

Good post.

[Vince Green]

8 hours ago, Rob85 said:

Depletion of funding for the armed forces? We have 2 brand new aircraft carriers, a brand new fleet of state of the art fighter aircraft and another home grown one in development, new drone system to go in tandem with it under development that the company I work for is submitting a bid for. Upgrading the already world class challenger 2 MBT, these are just projects I can think of off the top of my head.

Apart from downsizing some of the military I think technologically we aren't doing too bad. Remember a lot of the stuff that was gotten rid of was well past its use by date.

Most defence spending one way or another ends up as jobs for somebody. So its really not in the country's interest to reduce the spend if it just creates more unemployment. 

[oowee]

I have long been a believer in a basic constitution that sets out the way any government must manage the country. Self sufficient in energy water and food would be at the start of it. 

[Newbie to this]

3 minutes ago, oowee said:

I have long been a believer in a basic constitution that sets out the way any government must manage the country. Self sufficient in energy water and food would be at the start of it. 

[Vince Green]

3 hours ago, oowee said:

I have long been a believer in a basic constitution that sets out the way any government must manage the country. Self sufficient in energy water and food would be at the start of it. 

The classic example of that was coal. Back in the 70s some accountant at the (then) electricity generating board decided he could buy coal cheaper from Poland than he could buy it from the British Coal Board, So he did

Result? the British mines closed, Thousands of miners lost their jobs and we have paid billions to Poland over the years to buy something we have a thousand years supply of beneath our feet. Totally free as far as the country is concerned, yes there would be a cost to dig it out but its an internal cost. No money goes abroad.

Down in SteveB's part of South Wales in the Rhonda they are still feeling the effects of those pit closures. Some families have lived on the dole for three generations and the fourth generation is set to follow. How much has that cost the Nation? 

and all because Poland (then a communist country) was selling coal cheaply because it wanted western hard currency. And we fell for it 

Look at our dependence on China. Last week we bought a TV from Currys. Japanese Brand name but made in China.

Edited March 10, 2022 by Vince Green

[Newbie to this]

Yep, it all needs to change. It's going to be costly, but eventually it will pay off.

Not that I think it will happen.

[oowee]

12 hours ago, Vince Green said:

The classic example of that was coal. Back in the 70s some accountant at the (then) electricity generating board decided he could buy coal cheaper from Poland than he could buy it from the British Coal Board, So he did

Result? the British mines closed, Thousands of miners lost their jobs and we have paid billions to Poland over the years to buy something we have a thousand years supply of beneath our feet. Totally free as far as the country is concerned, yes there would be a cost to dig it out but its an internal cost. No money goes abroad.

Down in SteveB's part of South Wales in the Rhonda they are still feeling the effects of those pit closures. Some families have lived on the dole for three generations and the fourth generation is set to follow. How much has that cost the Nation? 

and all because Poland (then a communist country) was selling coal cheaply because it wanted western hard currency. And we fell for it 

Look at our dependence on China. Last week we bought a TV from Currys. Japanese Brand name but made in China.

Agreed and all could have been avoided. We could then transition from coal to more sustainable fuels and so on. Over the last year I have bought a Honda Engine, a Honda tender, a Husquvarna robot. a Stihl chain saw all made in Chine. We do our very best to buy rebuilt older stuff rather than fuel the Chinese tat production lines. They are the next rogue state waiting in the wings. 

I am just hoping that the fuel crisis is one of price rather than supply, as Saudi ramp up. At least then the demand will reduce and some sort of equilibrium can be reached. 

[bruno22rf]

Not sure everything is owned by foreign companies, I'm flying the British flag sat in my new Jag with a lovely cup of Tetley tea 🤥.

[discobob]

4 minutes ago, bruno22rf said:

Jag

Owned by Tata Motors buddy - Indian

I also own a Jag.......

[bruno22rf]

4 minutes ago, discobob said:

Owned by Tata Motors buddy - Indian

I also own a Jag.......

Yup,  my point, so is Tetley Tea....

[discobob]

3 minutes ago, bruno22rf said:

Yup,  my point, so is Tetley Tea....

Never knew that

[old man]

20 hours ago, oowee said:

I have long been a believer in a basic constitution that sets out the way any government must manage the country. Self sufficient in energy water and food would be at the start of it. 

Maybe that's why we don't have one? Easier to wreak havoc unchallenged?