Privatisation

[Thomas]

You guys are forgetting a whole set of society who have not kept up with the tech.

im not sure about where you live, but i would argue there are very few elderly in this day and age who havent kept up with "tech" as you put it. Its an essential need in this modern world in every facet of life.

[johnofgwent]

No I said who needs a landline phone obviously as T00ts pointed out there are people with no mobiles and don't understand computers who do.

Anyway I'll comment any further on the extortionate gas and electric.

Well when I last switched hardly be anyone would supply me a a connection without one, and the only one who advertised it - virgin - wanted £7.50 a month more to do it.

We went for a deal with a landline and never plug a phone in.

[B0ycey]

Eh...just yes. Perhaps you are too wrapped up in your socialist fantasies to remember Edward Short, the Labour Secretary of State for Education and Science. He abolished free for school children over eleven in 1968, a full three years before Margaret Thatcher did the same thing for children over seven.

Edward Short didn't do anything. Secondary schools were already cutting milk due to budget constraints and Labour  (Wilson) just gave them the legal right to do so. It wasn't so much prevention but tradition and they could have still gave secondary children their milk if the schools could find money out of thin air. Thatcher was the milk snatcher. She actually targeted little bitty children the horrible horrible snatcher.

[Borchester]

Eh... just no. Perhaps you are too young to remember 'Thatcher Thatcher the Milk Snatcher'

Eh...just yes. Perhaps you are too wrapped up in your socialist fantasies to remember Edward Short, the Labour Secretary of State for Education and Science. He abolished free for school children over eleven in 1968, a full three years before Margaret Thatcher did the same thing for children over seven.

[B0ycey]

Milk first taken from children by Labour, first food bank appeared under Labour and I'm fairly sure the first privatisation happened under Labour.

Eh... just no. Perhaps you are too young to remember 'Thatcher Thatcher the Milk Snatcher' or forgot that it was Austerity not VAT cuts that sent people to the Food banks. And the privatisation act was in 1983 when Thatcher was in power because she had a thing for Heyek. Stop blaming Labour for Tory policies.

The problem with some of the users on here is that because you have been brainwashed in thinking Socialism is bad, even the Socialist policies that we all agree on must still be Tory ideas because Capitalism must win. Have you not realised yet that Capitalism is failing due to contradiction and the solution is more Socialism to fix it? Read up on Dialectical Materialism.

[srb7677]

Milk first taken from children by Labour, first food bank appeared under Labour and I'm fairly sure the first privatisation happened under Labour.

The first food banks definitely appeared under New Labour, but I believe it was Margaret Thatcher as Education Minister in the Heath government who took milk away from children. For which she became known for a time as Thatcher, milk snatcher.

And I am pretty sure it was her government in the 80s that kicked off the wave of privatisations, though New Labour carried it further. The utilities were definitely privatised on her watch.

[Nick]

With a forum full of Tory "hug a Johnson" Libertarians, it should be everyone. That is why we don't trust Labour isn't it guys? The dirty Socialists would re nationalise everything.

FYI, 'Road to Selfdom' was one of Thatchers favourite books.

Milk first taken from children by Labour, first food bank appeared under Labour and I'm fairly sure the first privatisation happened under Labour.

[srb7677]

Cromwell is right. We should have had governments with greater foresight installing nuclear power stations to provide clean and reliable energy. The lack of planning in such an important aspect of community safety is bordering on criminal, certainly a dereliction of their duty.

The problem with nuclear - or one of them - used to be the environmental concerns re storage of waste. Another was safety concerns. Insofar as the latter is concerned Chernobyl and Three Mile Island demonstrated the potential dangers. We need to be reassured that this is not going to be a concern now. As for the environmental concerns, that is trumped now by the climatological impacts of continued fossil fuels. Nuclear reactors do not produce CO2. Another problem was cost but with prices of the alternatives soaring, nuclear may well end up being cheaper by default.

Certainly, it makes no sense to be dependent upon unstable or hostile regimes for our energy. We are paying the price for that now in the name of globalisation. We need to start thinking strategically about where we source our energy, and who owns the companies supplying it.

As for nuclear, provided that I can be satisfied re safety and waste disposal and storage, I have come round to the idea that nuclear is the best as well as greenest option right now. We should not however be allowing the Chinese to build and run nuclear stations here. China is another potentially hostile and definitely illiberal and undemocratic regime.

But it is not possible to bring nuclear power stations online quickly. It will take years. In the meantime we are going to need shorter term fixes that may rely on increased use of coal and oil for a time, though to minimise that we should be expanding green sources like wind and tidal power as well as solar much more rapidly. And improving and expanding battery storage so that surplus energy when the wind is blowing or the sun is shining can be stored for times when there is an energy deficit.

[T00ts]

Cromwell is right. We should have had governments with greater foresight installing nuclear power stations to provide clean and reliable energy. The lack of planning in such an important aspect of community safety is bordering on criminal, certainly a dereliction of their duty.

But hasn't it been said for far too long that we haven't had governments capable of thinking long term in all sorts of areas. Everything lives and dies on the how the forthcoming next election will play out. One major element missing in Westminster in commonsense. If we can see what's needed why can't they?

[Barry]

Cromwell is right. We should have had governments with greater foresight installing nuclear power stations to provide clean and reliable energy. The lack of planning in such an important aspect of community safety is bordering on criminal, certainly a dereliction of their duty.

[B0ycey]

Regarding energy have we been driven up a cul de sac by gretas admirers? Germany is going back to coal fired and shouldn't long term plans have been made way back to ensure the continuity and security of our energy supplies,isn't that one  of the primary objectives of any govt regardless of colour.

The long term plan was to use gas before the transition to renewables as it is a cleaner fuel. Clearly that isn't much of an option now. We already have the coal plants in Europe so turning them back on must be seen as the lesser evil - when before we were shaming the third world for building new coal plants as otherwise they would have no power, now we seem OK with a little carbon in the air if it means the lights stay on so refiring them back up it seems. 

Nonetheless, what I will say, and the clown is totally correct here, on an island full of coal, it does make more sense to dig the stuff up than buy from the rest of the world whether the coal is used for steal or energy. Another Thatcher F@@@ up in my opinion that she made the rest of the world rich by buying in a commodity we have abundance of because the miners striked during the 'Winter of Discontent'.

[B0ycey]

No I said who needs a landline phone obviously as T00ts pointed out there are people with no mobiles and don't understand computers who do.

I guess you seem oblivious to the fact that it is the same line using the same network. Did I mention you get a phone number when your broadband is set up?

[Borchester]

Regarding energy have we been driven up a cul de sac by gretas admirers? Germany is going back to coal fired and shouldn't long term plans have been made way back to ensure the continuity and security of our energy supplies,isn't that one  of the primary objectives of any govt regardless of colour.

No, we have been driven into a corner because oil and gas is either discovered in Bongo Bongo land where the supply is controlled by Stone Age thugs or the Home Counties where the votes are controlled by middle class clowns who would see the UK sink beneath the waves before permitting fracking

[cromwell]

Regarding energy have we been driven up a cul de sac by gretas admirers? Germany is going back to coal fired and shouldn't long term plans have been made way back to ensure the continuity and security of our energy supplies,isn't that one  of the primary objectives of any govt regardless of colour.

[cromwell]

You said who still gets a landline. I pointed out people who want the Internet. And no, I don't know if it buffers but I can take an educated guess. Fibre optics is simply faster than signals in the air hence the premium price for optics.

No I said who needs a landline phone obviously as T00ts pointed out there are people with no mobiles and don't understand computers who do.

Anyway I'll comment any further on the extortionate gas and electric.