Westminstenders: War and Weirdos

[RedToothBrush]

With weirdos set to run No10 and Trump seemingly having started a new war in the Middle East, 2020 already looks set to be a cracking year.

To start off your year, it turns out that chinese curse about interesting times is actually a fallacy...

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_you_live_in_interesting_times

Happy New Year.

May we make 2030...

Sadly such buildings are utterly unsuitable for conversion to housing ....

The problem with that ... argument ... is that plenty of buildings that are, also get missed.

Also what's wrong with the paired kidney donor approach and swapping that space for something which could be used for residential purposes ?

Once again, if fripperies such as that can be used to prevent repurposing, then I call bollocks on "crisis". Hence DEQ. If you're not acting like it's a crisis. Then it isn't a crisis. Saves having to listen to an awful lot of guff from politicians.

Sadly such buildings are utterly unsuitable for conversion to housing ...
Not the case at all in Glasgow area. Countless examples of repurposing of buildings from this era and earlier into residential especially in City / town centre areas. Part of the strategy to repopulate centres.

Also part of Manchester and Liverpool strategy afaik?

They are talking about converting the upper floors of Beales to "Luxury Apartments." Debenhams will be bulldozed, I'll bet.

One hundred years ago, a similar retail disruption as the local horse economy collapsed: Stabes, saddlemakers, farriers, feed merchants, all finished thanks to Henry Ford.

Not the case at all in Glasgow area.

Sadly, it's becoming clear that Scotland and England cannot be compared in any meaningful sense anymore.

They are talking about converting the upper floors of Beales to "Luxury Apartments."

So still no crisis then. As I thought. Carry on.

Far too much of the limited new housing is aimed at the lucrative top end of the market
while trickle down - as usual - is not working for those on ordinary incomes

Retail is eating itself. Bournemouth WH Smith has the Post Office upstairs and M&S sandwiches downstairs. The farthest and grubbiest corners remain WH Smith.

The Post Office (the real one) became a Pizza Express and promptly closed down. It is now derilict. M&S closed, after years of staring uncomprehending across the precinct at all the people coming in and out of Primark.

Unlike Southampton, we still have HMV. People used to go to Southampton just to go to their huge HMV. They might do the journey in reverse if SW Trains didn't charge the price of a Game of Thrones Box Set to get here and back.

Meanwhile, over in Boscombe, the "Dr Who" police box, put in to reassure people that closing the police station would not mean a loss of officers, has been closed due to being vandalised, there being no police to guard it.

Mockers
All those empty doorways in Above Bar are now full of homeless locals

• caused by Universal Credit

The Bargate development is on hold East Street is on hold Marlands staggers on but still so much utter crap plastic imported from China being bought and sold with non existent planetary resources

I really wish we could have a like or applaud button on posts.

I agree with @Peregrina on the trains. Cornwall badly needs a reliable railway (heck, transport infrastructure, full stop) as does the North. It's fucking criminal that Leeds and Manchester are so forgotten.

I would happily ditch or modify the HS2 for a well-thought out transport policy. One that actually attempted to deal with air pollution, congestion and everyday headaches like commuting to work.

I speak as someone in the Midlands who would benefit from HS2. But selfishly, I want options in both directions and flourishing cities across the country.

AS my DF says, sometimes there must be something in the air ...

related to housing my London based DB sent this ...

IMPORTANT:
Analysis into Labour's loss of some Northern seats highlighting an astonishing change in age demographics there,
after the young fled elsewhere, for better opportunities

The old - as a group - are far more conservative and socially conservative

Ian Warrenn@election*_data

More
If you want to understand the election, you need to see this table.

Look at how these towns have changed over time, and think about the seats Labour lost. ....

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/11/labour-heartlands-gone-away-northern-towns

the Centre for Towns, a thinktank co-founded by the Labour leadership candidate and Wigan MP, Lisa Nandy, published revealing but little-noticed research
about a dozen of the northern seats lost by Labour to the Conservatives last month.

Between 1981 and 2011, all of them experienced huge decreases in the proportion of their young residents,
and similar increases in the proportion of retired people.

In County Durham, Bishop Auckland’s 18- to 24-year-olds went down by 25%, and its over-65s went up by almost 35%.
Last month, it was taken by the Tories after more than 80 yearss^ of Labour control.

Since the early 1980s, the narrowing of economic opportunities in much of the north and their widening in the south has transformed the electorate in many northern seats:

effectively shifting it to the right, given the strong Labour and Tory biases, respectively, of the young and oldd^.

The loss of many of these seats last month ought not to have been such a surprise; it was decades in the making.

Age, not class, is now what divides British voters most

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/dec/21/age-not-class-is-what-divides-british-voters-most

Since the early 1980s, the narrowing of economic opportunities in much of the north and their widening in the south has transformed the electorate in many northern seats:

And of course, the loss of jobs for retired folk isn't going to matter too much, nor the loss of Erasmus or limitations on travel. What will affect them is the NHS and the Care situation. Will the Tories listen to them?

Different age groups diverging even more in core beliefs and attitudes ... reflected in voting

More on the geographical age divide, with the young dominating the cities
while the old dominating rural and de-industrialised areas
.... a political and economic divide too, with the young feeling bitter resentment over housing in particular

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jan/12/old-young-gap-britain-generation-dysfunctional-family

Only a decade ago, the 18-24s narrowly favoured Labour over the Tories by 31% to 30%,
while 44% of the 65-plus demographic backed the Conservatives, with 31% voting Labour.

In the youngest age category, 62% of those who voted backed Labour, with only 19% voting Tory.
Among 25-34s Labour also had a majority.
But in the oldest part of the age range, the polarities were almost exactly reversed: 64% voted Tory and 17% supported Labour.

Self-evidently, a party system defined by age is a terrifying notion, institutionalising mutual mistrust and resentment.

generational divisions are rooted in some of the deepest structures of society, not least our polarised housing economy.
.....
There and elsewhere, simple unaffordability has concentrated home ownership at the upper end of the age range, while the only option available to younger people is renting.
....
About half the population in London, Birmingham, Manchester and other urban centres is now thought to be under 300^, whereas old people dominate rural and coastal places.

Between 1991 and 2014, the number of areas where the median age of the population was over 50 rose sevenfold.

inews.co.uk/news/jobcentre-staff-homeless-people-get-jobs-1362820
Jobcentre staff to be sent out on the streets to advise homeless people on getting jobs
The new government scheme will provide rough sleepers with help finding jobs

Which genius dreamt up this waste of time and money?

Talk about a failure to understand the problem.

How about sending the DWP to businesses to encourage employers to invest in rehab plans?

Which genius dreamt up this waste of time and money?

Where to start with this? How about having a decent housing policy so that no one need be homeless? Yes, some people will be difficult to accommodate but they would need some sort of specialist help.

An initiative in Scotland is doing something about the homeless crisis - social-bite.co.uk/housingfirst/. Get people somewhere to live first before they can tackle getting a job etc. Obvious, but sometimes the obvious isn't to lots of people.

I have to admit I am stumped as to why the older generations (i.e. my own) tend to vote Tory. They are most likely to need the NHS and know that the time will come relatively soon when they need Care. I don't trust the Tories with either of these.

Don't forget though - that the older generation are really two generations - the 60 - 75, the baby boom, and the older ones who were either old enough to fight in the war, or at least live through part of it, and both had very very different life experiences.

Because the NHS will always be there. The idea of not having the NHS hasn't occurred to them.

Because too, the Tories are craftily selling off the NHS but still allowing private firms to brand their services as NHS.

Now it wouldn't matter if say private non-profit making firms did provide services for the NHS - it's the way it's all been done by stealth which I find wrong.

Analysis into Labour's loss of some Northern seats highlighting an astonishing change in age demographics there

What did I say about 35 year olds of 2005 turning into 50 year olds of today ?

There's a sinister undertone here. The Tories are basically being rewarded for fucking the north over in the 80s and driving the youth out.

There is a real danger that pre-revolutionary France is being recreated - possibly unwittingly - in England. Let's hope there's enough tea to prevent the logical conclusion.

To be fair, urbanisation is happening all over the world: it's simply less noticeable here as we started it back in the Victorian times with the Enclosures Act. After the second world war, farming mechanisation rapidly hollowed out parts of the countryside and we are seeing this again with the knowledge economy shooting up. Reliable broadband, easy transport connections and quick access to the shops is now considered a standard part of life. I was one of the first wave of university students under Labour's plans to increase higher education. What I found in the University towns was all of the above. I would not now consider moving back to the country, to lesser services and opportunities. I know a lot of my contemporaries who feel the same way: we are now the ones raising families and buying homes. I can see the same happening for the two generations coming up behind me.

Of course, this does weight the youth vote in the city and nicely fucks over Labour under FPTP.

I would like to hear less of this 'Baby-Boom' and even less, none preferably, of the term 'Boomer.'

These are US terms describing US demographics. Our postwar babyboom was over before the US one peaked, then when the US birthrate fell, ours spiked in what was at the time called the baby-bulge.

Our 1970s were markedly different in many ways. We abolished conscription in 1960. We had the pill on the NHS for umarried women from 1967. We had Glam. Our punk rock was totally different and several years later. Then our music scene flowered in the 80s when the American one stagnated, as evidenced by all the UK bands in those John Hughes films.

It'll all turn out OK in the end, I'm sure.

Countries that fuck their youth only aren't very good at wars. Old gits not being so great at fighting and all that. Luckily the UK has no intention of fighting future wars alone, or it would be well and truly stuffed.

.....aaaaah, but flying kill-robots can be piloted by octagenarians. Bloodthirsty ones that aren't too arthritic yet.

Anyone booked with Flybe ?

www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-51089118

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