Westministenders: Boris and The By-Elections

[RedToothBrush]

You lot post too fast!

A50 has made it out of the Commons without any amends. Its on its way to the Lords, but this week is half term, so in theory not much going on (in the UK at least). It hit the Lords on the 20th where it might not get such an easy ride. The Lords will not (and CAN NOT) stop brexit or frustrate it. But the numbers are in perhaps more favour of amendments if they choose to go that way, than the Commons. This would throw the bill back to the Commons. This is pretty reasonable.

In the meantime its 12 days to go until the Copeland and Stoke Central By-Elections.

Leave.Eu think UKIP have Stoke in the bag. They think there will be a 33% turnout. I think a turnout that high is the land of fantasy. Paul Nuttalls who was at Hillsborough is now a devout Stokie who has lived there all his life. Except of course he isn't.

Copeland looks like it will go Conservative. Its theirs to throw away. It would be the first victory for a sitting government in a by-election since 1983 if they make it. They intend to use a victory as another argument for a 'mandate'. But have they managed to drop a nuclear booboo?

One more Question. What are the chances of this thread making it to the 23rd?!

The uk is one of the leaders in fushion power ATM and a couple of companies are starting to make small scale fusion reactors. It will be necessary to see how leaving the euratom affects iter etc

www.world-nuclear-news.org/NP-UK-nuclear-industry-faces-prospect-of-Euratom-exit-27011701.html

I had misunderstood about us permission to use the misused, scary and am happy to correct myself that they can be used without us permission. Thank you for your pointed sigh.

Missiles. Not misused.

Semi www.express.co.uk/news/uk/766183/Royal-Navy-plug-staff-shortage-urgent-plea-ex-sailors

Perhaps if dh finds retirement boring in 2019, he can go back in the mob for 5 years. especially if Engineer Officers are a shortage!

scaryteacher The 2% certainly is symbolic in Luxembourg's case; it's shortfall versus the 2% is roughly $0.8 billion, versus US defence spending of the order of $0.6 trillion.

So Luxembourg meeting its commitment would increase NATO spending by approximately 0.1%. I think symbolic is a rather good description.

Doesn't mean they shouldn't do it; but in the context of increased Russian aggression in Eastern Europe and the cost of maintaining a nuclear deterrent, $800 million is the square root of bugger all.

Germany had to pull its soldiers off exercise because they had hit the overtime limit (rofl).

Laugh by all means. I was recently reading a book by the widow of Olaf Schmid, (despite the name, a UK bomb disposal expert), who was killed in Afghanistan whilst defusing a bomb. The book makes it clear that lack of equipment and extreme tiredness were factors contributing to his death.

The UK only makes the 2% because it decided to redo how it defines its spending... we fudged the figures.

The uk is one of the leaders in fushion power ATM

Is this the nuclear fusion that has been "a decade away" since I was 10 - back in the 1970s ?

The worst cuts were made long before the financial crisis

I know, which is why I said 'years of defence cuts' in my first post, and agreed with that aspect of your previous post. Prior cuts went back to the 90s. Before that there wasn't a huge change from the late 70s to the early 90s in numbers of UK service personnel.

The cuts due to the financial crisis are simply the most recent, and may not have been made but for the crisis.

Either way, our armed forces are now poorly prepared to defend against a serious military attack. When a senior commander General Sir Richard Barrons retired last year he warned we could defend ourselves against terrorism, but in the case of a Russian air attack neither the land nor our forces would be adequately protected.

Scary, I'm not up to speed on the RN or Army at all.
I did hear a rumour recently though that the RN were so undermanned that on a recent exercise the manning situation was so critical that just a few people going sick would have led to the exercise being shelved.

Reading the link you posted about trying to woo ex RN, similar is underway for the RAF now too - loads of ex techies being wooed back as full time reservists & various other schemes.

I did a course just over a year ago with a RM WO who said they were desperately struggling for manpower too.

scaryteacher 80,000 was the austerity target after the 2010 defence review, we just got there ahead of time.

The number of reservists was supposed to increase but it didn't happen.

I wasn't disagreeing with you Gloria, just embellishing more on how we've got to the current manning crisis.

The shortage of skilled people is a massive problem at the mo - and unlike the unskilled roles a simple recruitment increase can't solve it.

The 2010 defence review was a disaster.

That's the one lurking, except I understand from people who know far more about it than me that fusion is now an engineering challenge rather than a fundamental principles of physics challenge - i.e. A bit easier and perhaps only 10 years away

No worries Semi.

except I understand from people who know far more about it than me that fusion is now an engineering challenge rather than a fundamental principles of physics challenge

it's always been an engineering challenge (like the Moon missions, by the way). The underlying physics are well understood (they need to be to get the multi-stage weapons to work). In the absence of a wonder material that can contain the immense heat and pressure fusion generates, we're stuck with magnetism, electrostatics, and some very involved timing of pulses.

Personally, if I were in charge, I would go hell-for-leather on Thorium power which has a much more practical pedigree. However, it doesn't produce fissile material for bombs, or research data for better H-Bombs.

The first country that can become completely self-sufficient in energy (electricity) would never need to import fuel again. With enough electricity, you can make whatever you want.

Even thinking about positive energy solutions, remembering the old days with the race relations act, the Warnock report on the rights of students with disabilities, libraries, publicly managed and accountable schools and hospitals, equal opportunities legislation and workers' rights, makes me nostalgic. Politicians, journalists and lawyers could have opinions without being threatened with death.

Simpler times. It's true about the past being a foreign country

On the effectiveness of the cruelty of trolls:
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/feb/16/ukip-troll-hillsborough-arron-banks

The shortage of skilled people is a massive problem at the mo

We have essentially full employment for people with relevant technical skills. The armed forces struggle to compete with private sector companies offering better working and living conditions.

Brexit may help with army recruitment if it destroys skilled jobs (which it will: my employer is looking at moving some production to Eastern Europe).

I don't think recruitment is the problem though - the forces offer a good pay/training package for the younger members.

Retention is the problem - especially amongst the skilled trades.
Successive govts caused this with repeated devaluing of skilled tradespeople, including messing with the pay scales.

Paying trained & qualified aircraft technicians (for example) the same as admin clerks, drivers, suppliers & cooks was a sure fire way to ensure that, once trained & experienced, the techies would bugger off to civilian jobs which remunerated much, much better.

Wars always help with recruitment, irrespective of whether we have the resources to fight one.

(That post read back as snippy, it wasn't meant to )

Xpost = I don't know. I've read that the forces are recruiting 90% of what they need.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-27138087

The Joint European Torus (JET) was an EU funded research project with expertise (blasted experts) from across the EU. There was a European School and everything in Culham. It still gets EU funding, but I think there is some project now operating or coming into operation in France.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_European_Torus

Cailleach - my son works at the Culham site although not on JET. They have always had significant numbers of EU staff - they are already leaving. Two people my son worked with have already gone - to other EU collaborations.

the forces offer a good pay/training package for the younger members.

It's a lifestyle thing as well though. They still have to compete for skills with private sector employers who offer better/ more family friendly working conditions and no risk of a violent death.

There's no quick cure for the skill shortage in skilled occupations, except reducing demand (by destroying jobs) or importing immigrant workers.