With the NHS understaffed it has become a problem to stick to the rules regarding being vaccinated to continue working in high risk areas...also care home staff fall into the same category. Maybe the Government didn't realize how many staff would say no to the vaccination scheme..and have been rather surprised at the no vaccine numbers. notDistant reminds us of past vaccination situations...smallpox, polio, mumps etc and how they have changed the world for the better....so I find it hard to understand how as a nurse/doctor/care home worker you can say no and work in areas that are dangerous for them and those that they care for. The Government could have stood their ground and sacked or moved away from these dangerous working areas those that refused the jab....but they have withdrawn to allow short staffing levels not to get even worse than they are....difficult decision...but surely the right one unfortunately to allow patients to be fully cared for.. What I noticed was that some were prepared to move over to working for the NHS in Wales ?....that is still the same NHS isn't it....the Welsh Government should not be able to do that and neither should Scotland or N Ireland either. Maybe new staff taken on should not be able to opt out of being vaccinated...picking and choosing what you will do isn't on.
What you mean is the Government has bottled the fight it would have had. I am not an anti vax person but like all things in life it is for the individual to choose something put into them or not. You cannot make people have something they are not comfortable with. You had a choice so why not them and it doesn't make it right or wrong just because it's something you wouldn't do. What the caring fraternity did was make a stand and basically say I am not being forced so sack me if you must. What the Government did was chicken out of the original stance because they know as well as you do that the NHS and Care Homes would be shut if they pushed it. Public opinion would have soon turned against the powers that be and as we all know they don't like getting the blame for anything. Johnson and his mob do things by throwing out an idea and seeing what bounces back with popular opinion. If it's quiet they do it but if it doesn't look like going their way they bin the whole thing. That isn't Governing. I hope for your sake considering the judgemental stance you take on this that none of your family have to go into a hospital but if they do that you have one with staff left in it. I will guarantee the last question you would be asking is have they been jabbed or not. If they haven't then I hope you will decline entry and just go home. I will also guarantee that you won't of course and your moral stance will not even come into it.
I'm becoming suspicious the Government know I've stopped voting for them since Brexit and are victimising me personally. They're giving £200 off energy bills to be recouped at £40 a year for the following 5 years. But I fixed for 2 years back in August (and yes my supplier is still going) so I neither need it nor want it now. On the other hand, I certainly don't want to be repaying £40 a year for something I didn't need when my fixed deal runs out and I then get hit with what may still be much higher market prices. There's also a £150 Council Tax rebate which I don't get!
I don't want a £200 rebate either. All it will do for those struggling is give them some respite now. However, next year in their struggles they will be yet another £1 a week worse off, I don't need the charity even if it is loaned charity. I will get £150 off my Council Tax which I also don't want and don't need. I am waiting for the sting in the tail where local authorities will get their funding cut but some or all of that and the Government will have given nothing itself. You know how slippery this lot are with their funding packages so it wouldn't surprise me one bit. I was shocked the other day to listen to what goes towards making the inflation figure. Just about everyone buys fuel and power. Everyone has to buy food. Loads have to travel for work although I sort of put that under the fuel title. But, please explain to me how a caravans price affects families? Real inflation, and not including their daft items, is running well over the percentage they quote now. I have noticed over the last few months how many of the items a lot will buy have increased in cost. Things that cost £1 are £1.10 or £1.20. A lot of value products exclusive to a supermarket chain have been discontinued. That means if you want the item you pay a much higher price for it. I would say my food bill has gone up around 15 to 20% in that time. Will fuel prices ever go down. Will gas or electricity go down if the price on the markets falls. Will food prices ever fall back if their overheads are reduced. You know it won't. I listened to a supermarket boss the other day say their costs have risen and they have no choice but to pass it on. I also remember not long ago the super market chains posting record profits during the pandemic.
It's a basket of costs that represents real world spending, weighted pro rata. It changes over time to reflect the public's habits and changing technology. You are right though: buying patterns vary with income. The poor spend proportionately more on basics like rent (rather than mortgage interest), food, light and heat. There's been a lot of noise about this recently in support of the argument that benefits should go up....
Today has been fascinating to some degree with the news on offer. The first one I saw was Cressida telling the news world that she was not going to go under any circumstances. Then we had Boris telling the Universe that the World was on a precipice with war possibly looming. After that was our so called Foreign Secretary being put down in public by the peskie Ruskies. I have never heard so much bullshit hitting fans and being spouted in all of my life. Well that's an exaggeration but you get the drift. Yet again there was a poor report on the Met Police. Cressida was still taking her lead from the Boris book of no shame and wasn't going to take the responsibility for it. She was finally pushed and about time to. Boris was on his feet and his lips were moving so you knew there was a lie there somewhere. We are nowhere near a war with Russia no matter what crap is being bandied about. This is his cynical scare mongering to take the heat, or so he wants to, out of his own personal resigning subject. I will tell everyone to be scared ****less and they may forget I'm a liar. As for one of his possible replacements, she was trying to play hardball at a meeting with the counterpart and he was taking the piss by saying she wasn't even listening and spouting rubbish. One more thing was the opportunistic announcement that after their little holiday from Westminster Boris was going to set us all free from Covid. Whoopee!!!! All hail the hero of the hour. Well it was just a bribe to his detractors so that in the break they might all forget partygate as well. He really has no shame at all does he. Incidentally I was listening to a Haulier today telling the truth about all the red tape we were supposed to have been freed from after Brexit. They now have at least a half dozen more bits of paperwork to complete and get right that they didn't have before. The cost of moving stuff has gone up by around half and his drivers get stuck in huge queues to get in and out of the Country. Remind me Brexit people, what were all these savings and benefits we were going to have? Suddenly I am loads worse off when I was told we would have savings of £365m a week to spend on the NHS. The working man's NI is increasing to pay for that so where has the £365m a week gone? Anyone see any benefits at all?
I admit I don't usually run this empty, being down to around 90 miles range, but I filled the car with diesel this morning. £86 no less. Rather than going down, it's gone up due to "fears of conflict in Ukraine".
Your lucky notDistant that your diesel vehicle is 'new' enough to still be able to use.....My son has a greetings card franchise and instead of a small van he has a large estate car....which he can use as the 'family' car outside of his delivery working hours. He had a very nice big Rover 75 Estate...which was an automatic but a DIESEL....unfortunately for him it was getting old....but still had years left in it.....but our little Hitler Mayor of London extended the exclusion zone to be out as far as the South Circular.....which means that my son cannot reach some of his greeting card area...which includes Canary Wharf without driving into that area....the cost and the fines are madness itself....He has to pay £13 x 2 for short parking time as well in Canary Wharf that is besides the diesel tariff ? So he had to change it...he couldn't sell it....and had to accept £350 scrappage value according to its weight.....really heartbreaking...it was a good comfortable car. He has bought a similar aged petrol Volvo estate....certainly not so comfortable and the storage area is smaller than the Rover......and the petrol engine isn't a patch on the Rover diesel for life expectancy.
Been watching the TV game show....House of Games...one of the rounds was a map of Africa....the celebrities had to show on their tablets where,,,,the highest mountain in Africa was (Kilomanjaro).....where the Pyramid of Giza was and where the capital of Nigeria was.......None of them had any idea....and not one of them got near any of the countries that the answers were in.
Conflict in Ukraine is imminent says our Foreign Secretary even though the news today has been of troop withdrawals from the area rather than further build up. They haven't all gone home by a long shot but all of the rhetoric coming the other way out of Moscow is that they don't want a war in Europe. Boris says it's still on along with a few other heads of state around the World. Every each one of them has a vested interest in this scare mongering being carried on. I said it before and will say it again, there isn't going to be a war and there never was. This is yet another attempt by Boris and chums to change the subject and focus away from him personally. It is a pathetic attempt to hope people will forget partygate if they sound scary enough about something else. I would love to be a Journo right now and get to put a question to Boris direct and on camera. "So Prime Minister, following all the false alarms over a war that was never going to happen, what exactly is your answer to were you at a party in Downing Street and why did you lie about it to Parliament and the people?" I do it just to show it isn't forgotten no matter how hard they try shock news.
As far at the Ukraine is concerned there has been a war in Europe for the last 8 years on its eastern border with the separatist forces that want to be part of Russia....first it was the Crimea area that the west was caught flat footed over.....Ukrainians are adamant that it won't happen again. In fact Boris is a very small unsignificant part of this whole affair.
How dare you Plymborn. Boris has been here there and everywhere to meet people and instruct them on what to do next. He has even been to Ukraine to tell them they are in the **** and Vlad is coming for them. He probably drove a tank to the front line just to show them Ruskies he was there. He's very important you know. Or more to the point it was a bit of "Look everyone I am not at a party I'm saving the Planet again with my super powers." Insignificant indeed................ The attempts that man will make to save his own skin are phenomenal. There literally are no lengths he won't go to or depth he will not sink to. It is so embarrassing. Even Truss was being laughed at by the Russia Diplomat during a meeting. It was all he could do to stop himself rolling around the carpet laughing out loud. If you believe any of this bullshit then more fool you. It ain't happening and it probably never was.
Truss in the job for only weeks.....the Russian Foreign Minister...18 years....game...set...and match....I think.....if that was her effort to say I can replace Boris...I would say she failed dismally
The worst part of all of this is that there doesn't appear to be any MP currently that would be suitable for the job. They are all a load of chinless wonders and that includes all parties. What happened to the days where you had a line of personalities you could at least relate to. I'm still in the "Anyone but Boris" camp though as much as it irks me to say it.
Top men/women don't go into politics to serve their country anymore....they go into big business and earn ten fold what a politician can.....and we think that they are over paid plus all their expenses that they fiddle.....anyone claimed on their duck pond house recently.
I remember way back when my then colleagues & I were told we could only have diesel company cars to save the environment. We all considered this to be a joke. At that time, I travelled regularly from my base at Exeter to Dorset & Portland down the A35. Going up those lovely hills with a 5 speed box, I left a smokescreen a Challenger tank would be proud of. My current car has an 8 speed gearbox, meets the latest EU standard, has an AdBlue thingy & does 60mpg on a long run if she drives and low 50's if I do. It's taken billions in investment to make that change though and now we're told it was wrong. Meanwhile we're throwing more billions at electric cars and the transmission network to charge them. Hydrogen is the right way.
Ignoring our embarrassing situation: a comedy Government & next to no influence now we're outside the EU but the western world does need to stand up to Putin. What we can offer seems doubtful. It seems our entire fleet of Type 45 destroyers was in port last week with recurring engine problems. HMS Diamond has been dispatched but is not carrying anti-ship missiles as we have few of our ageing weapons available whilst the MOD try to decide what to replace them with. As I understand it, we can't decide whether to build one with the French or buy off the shelf and are still at the stage of wondering whether to get a hypersonic one that's too fast to shoot down or a stealthy one you can't see coming in the first place, so still at what you might call a fairly early stage. Similarly the cruise missile carried by our submarines is so old the Americans will cease supplying and supporting it soon. This follows the recent documentary series on board Plymouth based HMS Nothumberland, one of the ageing Type 23 Frigates awaiting replacement by the delayed and overspent Type 26. This appeared to have been a full-on deployment including contact with Russian spy ships, submarines and aircraft in the North Sea and Arctic. There were a catalogue of problems: the seal around the main gun failed in an Arctic gale causing significant flooding. Sailors were seen baling out with plastic buckets. There was a fire in the mast depriving the ship of navigation equipment. Whilst tracking a submarine suspected of snooping on Internet cables, a circuit board in the sonar failed causing a loss of contact. The Merlin helicopter dispatched to find it had an inadequate number of sonobouys. In the Army, the new armoured personnel carrier being procured from the Americans vibrates too badly to fire its gun when moving and requires crew and soldiers to wear ear defenders. In the RAF, the Typoon is soldiering on but is a 4th Generation fighter in a 5th Generation era. The F35 is arriving very slowly, is horrifically expensive and is encumbered by all that complicated gear that allows it to land vertically on carriers which the RAF doesn't need. Meanwhile the MOD is hankering for the Tempest, as yet to be specified, designed and built. They are at the stage where they can't decide whether it should have a pilot or not. Starting from there, and looking at the history of the Typhoon, what do you think.. 20 or 25 years before we see that in service? Our defence procurement is a joke. We live in a very dangerous world with aggressive dictators in both Russia and China. The MOD needs to be turned upside down and shaken violently. The Government needs to stop cutting the quantity and quality of the kit bought as punishment for poor cost control and sort out the reasons for overspending in the first place. To avoid gaps capability, stuff that works now may have to be bought off the shelf without expensive and risky tailoring to British preferences.
It all went wrong when we stopped having ships of wood and men of steel notdistant. Ah them were the days. Anyway looks like I may have been wrong and those pesky Ruskies have popped over the border. Never mind though Boris was pictured in a Tank the other day so if he still has it he will sort them out.
I am currently having a discussion with my energy supplier who happens to be EDF. I was talked into having a smart meter a while back on the basis that I would eventually have to have it anyway and that I would never have to supply a reading again. My smart meter being smart would talk to their smart computer system and between them they would sort out my future bills. Me and her indoors got a surprise about a week ago. I got a letter telling me I needed to give them a reading as there "appeared to be a problem between the machines communicating". I have no booklet and I was never shown how to get a reading from a smart meter. However, the following day before I had chance to do anything I got a bill on my account. It said that I owed them over £500 and they were virtually trebling my direct debit. I have two readings one for day and one for night otherwise known as economy 7. They managed to get a reading for one of them it said but had estimated the other. Strange they could get one if it wasn't communicating was my first thought. Anyway the estimated reading bore no resemblance to any reading I have ever had before. It was as good as 4 times normal usage. Now if they estimate you would think they might look at previous and get it roughly right but obviously not. After several goes at their chat line I got a person who within 10 minutes had got a reading, cancelled the bill and issued me a correct one which I would see on line in due course. I was in fact nearly £50 in credit. He also reinstated my DD to it's original amount. Now I wasn't happy with the estimated bit and being told the machines couldn't talk to each other when clearly they could so I emailed them. I got an answer the next day which basically told me what I already knew except it didn't bother to answer any of my questions. So I tried again. Emphasised the questions which was mainly about the estimated figure and how they had managed to arrive at it. I replied originally to the person who had answered the first email. I have now got another reply. From a different person of course. This time they said I had nothing to worry about and proceeded to tell me all the things they first told me but again not answering the actual questions I had asked for the second time. I have now tried a third time and told them I will keep asking the question even if I get to have an email off every single member of their office. Once I've exhausted that I will try the Ombudsman and see if they can get a proper answer. What gets me most is they seem to try to treat you as somebody who just needs consoling rather than answering anything you ask. If they had even said hands up we cocked up and sorry I would have just let it go. But they can't can they and telling me I have nothing to worry about when previously they tried to tell me I was hundreds of pounds in debt. Never mind the small matter of them taking nearly £250 a month from my bank account when they had made an error.
Energy companies always over estimate bills by a long way.....because it gets a response from the customer.....just a smaller amount and most people don't notice and nothing gets put right.
