TheGrandNagus

@TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Digital driving licences to be ‘put on phones this year’⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Reminder that the UK is actually fairly lax in comparison to other countries when it comes to showing your drivers licence to police. Most countries require you to have it with you when you drive, the UK does not.

  If you don’t want to show your license, don’t. Say you left it at home.

  They can request that you come into a police station with it within 7 days, but in reality they probably won’t because they can trivially search for this information anyway.

  Certainly don’t hand over an unlocked phone.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Patients dying in hospital corridors, say nurses⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  It’s been 6 months, why hasn’t Labour completely cleared the backlog, cured the flu, and completely fixed the NHS yet?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Private parking rules review prompted by £2,000 five-minute fine⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Anybody who’s ever dealt with these companies knows exactly how scummy they are.

  Pervious governments kept saying they’d do something about it, even announcing price caps (I think to £70 but I can’t remember), but it would always be silently scrapped after all the positive headlines had done their job.

  I suppose the good part of having a Labour government is that if they were to announce this and scrap it, it would be in headlines for a week, so they’d be a lot less likely to do it.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨UK government removes highest number of illegal migrants in 5 years⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Still a lot lower than under Blair, but I suppose it’s still a lot better than the Tories.

  Doubt we’ll see this on many fronts pages, though.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Pound falls further as UK borrowing costs soar⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Angers me so much that we didn’t make use of cheap borrowing while rates were so low.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨'Ripped off' caravan owners start compensation fight⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  They’re such a scam.

  Two family members – one who isn’t good with money and the other in the early stages of dementia – bought a static caravan together. They came to regret it.

  The caravan itself was as expensive as a seaside flat (albeit in an area of inexpensive Northumbrian mining towns), except unlike a flat it’s an asset that depreciates massively, like a car, except even worse.

  The APR on the loan was 14%.

  Gas bottles cost a lot.

  You had to have insurance (fair enough), but only through the caravan site’s company (absolutely not fair enough). As you can likely guess, their pricing was dreadful.

  The site fees alone were almost £4000 a year, roughly the same as my mortgage on a 3 bedroom house (again, impoverished Northumberland seaside town, so pretty cheap mortgage). When you take into consideration they couldn’t pay that in a lump sum and so also had that as a 14% APR loan in addition to the caravan itself, it cost more than my mortgage for site fees alone.

  Once the caravan is 10 years old you have to get rid of it. And you do not get good prices reselling them, because everybody else is trying to sell old static caravans of that age too.

  Throughout the whole process, the sales rep tried to obfuscate details, fail to mention things, pretend that fees wouldn’t go up over time (they did, a lot). Not only that, he tried to create a sense of urgency that this had to be done quick otherwise they’d miss out – the same tactic used by phone scammers to force mistakes!

  Some liability goes to my auntie of course, but not everyone is good at sifting through and properly understanding financial documents, and these companies know this. They take advantage. They’re every bit as predatory as payday loan companies IMO.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Motorist gets ticket for being stuck in Lincoln hospital car park⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Private parking companies are absolute scum. Anybody who’s ever had the misfortune of dealing with them can attest to this.

  The fact that the NHS were forced to sell a bunch of carparks to these criminals boils my piss on an almost weekly basis.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Appeal court refuses to increase child rapist’s four-year jail sentence⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  As the crimes were committed in the 1980s, Roberts’ sentence reflected the legal norms of that period.

  I can see the logic to this, but holy shit, was 4 years for sexually abusing a 7 year old a typical sentence back then?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Anglian Water fined £300,000 for sewage pollution in Norfolk⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Kill thousands of fish and god knows what other wildlife, get a measly £300k fine that will be paid by customers rather than management anyway.

  Yet another turd in the septic tank that is Thatcher’s legacy of privatising everything that used to be owned by the public.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Ministers considering renationalising British Steel if rescue plan fails⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Given the current Chinese owners are battling tooth and nail to not have to foot 50% of the bill for the new furnaces (which is already generous from the gov), I highly doubt they are good custodians of British Steel in the long term.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨MPs vote in favour of historic bill to allow assisted dying after emotional debate⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Canada literally isn’t the UK.

  The motion that was passed is nothing like the framework Canada has.

  Plenty of countries ban drinking alcohol. You may as well be saying that having restrictions on alcohol for under 18s means it’s a slippery slope and it’ll be banned here. After all, Saudi Arabia literally did it. America literally did it. Qatar literally did it. Etc.

  Like I said, I want evidence. Not slippery slope fallacy. Show me MPs saying they intend to implement the system Canada has.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨MPs vote in favour of historic bill to allow assisted dying after emotional debate⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Because “they just will mate. Slippery slope innit.” isn’t one IMO.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨MPs vote in favour of historic bill to allow assisted dying after emotional debate⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Lol you’re just trolling now. You don’t even know how half of those work.

  Calling out the slippery slope argument for being the no sense that it is is not an example of circular reasoning.

  Me sharing my experience and saying that I think you’d have a different view if you had seen what I’ve seen is not an anecdotal fallacy - that is where you use anecdotes and try to represent them as objective facts.

  I didn’t dismiss your view via ad populum fallacy, I just said it’s pointless moaning about the idea of people dying painlessly if they choose because the debate has already been settled by MPs and the public don’t have the appetite to have them backtrack on it.

  The appeal to authority fallacy is about dismissing an opinion as being invalid because an authorative figure days otherwise. That’s not what I said. I said the debate has been settled, so it’s pointless campaigning against right now.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨MPs vote in favour of historic bill to allow assisted dying after emotional debate⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  It literally is a fallacy.

  And again, this is nothing like the protocols Canada has.

  You need to be terminally ill with less than 6 months to live, of sound mind, have the go-ahead from two unaffiliated doctors, and it needs to be reviewed and signed off by a judge.

  You’re advocating for real, horrific, suffering to continue because hypothetically the law could be changed in future in a way that could be bad.

  I’ve worked in care homes full of people who barely sleep, and spend their entire days in agony that you and I cannot even conceive of. They begged to die. They begged us to covertly kill them. But our job was to forcefully keep them alive against their will, prolonging their suffering for as long as possible. Seriously harrowing stuff.

  If you had seen that, day in day out, I doubt you’d have this “we need to make them suffer, because hypothetically in X years we could be like Canada, where some doctors made a recommendation they really shouldn’t have.”

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Typhoo Tea falls into adminstration⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  No, they aren’t correct. They just happen to like their tea prepared differently, and look down on anybody who doesn’t like what they like.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨MPs vote in favour of historic bill to allow assisted dying after emotional debate⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  If you think offering people with less than 6 months to live a way to die painlessly and with dignity is actually a conspiracy to mass-murder anybody on benefits, then you are a fucking lunatic.

  You can take issue with the bill without spinning some conspiracy theory about Starmer wanting to bring about a second Holocaust.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨MPs vote in favour of historic bill to allow assisted dying after emotional debate⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  So the slippery slope fallacy, got it.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨MPs vote in favour of historic bill to allow assisted dying after emotional debate⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  This is an amazing change. I’ve seen way too many people suffering in a way that before my previous job, I couldn’t have even begun to imagine. People in agony begging to die but being forced to live.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨MPs vote in favour of historic bill to allow assisted dying after emotional debate⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Except this is nothing like the procedure Canada has in place.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Typhoo Tea falls into adminstration⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  It’s tragic that you drink tea to feel classy, rather than to simply enjoy it as a drink.

  And to answer your question - a lot of countries add milk to tea. I don’t know where this myth that only the UK does it comes from.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Typhoo Tea falls into adminstration⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Stop chatting shit.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Transport Secretary Louise Haigh resigns after Sky News revealed mobile phone guilty plea⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  In 2013, Haigh was 24-years-old and working as a public policy manager for the insurance company Aviva.

  Following reports by Sky and The Times on Thursday, Haigh issued a statement, explaining she made a police report after a “terrifying” mugging in London.

  She said she reported the phone as one of a number of items she believed had been stolen, and was issued with a new work phone.

  Some time later, she discovered the handset was still in her house, and she switched it on, which “triggered police attention” and she was called in for questioning.

  “My solicitor advised me not to comment during that interview and I regret following that advice,” she said, and the matter was sent to magistrates.

  Haigh said she pleaded guilty to making a false report to police at a magistrates’ court, six months before becoming an MP in the 2015 election, and received a discharge - the “lowest possible outcome”.

  I’m surprised she’s resigning over something so minor tbh.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Tough news for protesting farmers: Labour doesn’t actually need their votes⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  This.

  I’m so tired of people on social media dismissing me (who has lived in the countryside my entire life) as a clueless citydweller whenever I speak about:

  • This farmland IHT debate

  • Foxhunting

  • Using pesticides that don’t mass-kill bees and other critical insects

  • People having a right to roam/being against landowners illegally blocking off public footpaths

  • The amount of land multimillionaires purposely keep barren just so they can go grouse-shooting

  There’s this myth pushed predominantly by right wingers that everybody who doesn’t live in a highly urbanised area agrees with farmers on everything.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨British PM Starmer criticised for meeting China's Xi as Hong Kong freedom protesters were being jailed⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, former chair of the Democratic Party in Hong Kong, Emily Lau, suggested Sir Keir’s meeting with Xi at the G20 a mere hours before the sentencing meant the UK’s agreements with China over the governance of the territory before its handover in 1997 were “evaporating”.

  Evaporating? The handover agreements have been completely ignored. It’s gone. And unfortunately, we can’t really do much about it.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Sex workers need the police to do better, not more⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Our laws around sex work need serious overhaul. The current quasi-legal system just doesn’t work and necessitates unnecessary risk to workers, and the fact that some aspects of sex work aren’t legal discourages an open and trusting relationship between sex workers and police.

  New Zealand has a decent framework of sex work laws. That is what we should be emulating IMO.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Richard Flanagan wins Baillie Gifford prize but rejects £50,000 over sponsor’s fossil fuel ties⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  Yup. This is a better idea.

  Take their money, publicly tell them to fuck off while donating it to a cause that go against them.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why it’s time for the UK to introduce a new law to allow assisted dying⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  This proposed law cannot be applied to disabled people anyway. Only people with a terminal illness and under 6 months left to live are eligible.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨David Lammy dismisses past criticism of Donald Trump as 'old news'⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  As much as I’d love to munch some popcorn and see Lammy double down on calling Trump out for being a fascist dickhead, that obviously wouldn’t be in the interest of the UK and would probably be an unwise thing for the Foreign Secretary of all ministers to do.

  Unfortunately, Trump did win an election and we do have to put up with him/navigate around him for the next four years.

  I do hope, though, that the Republicans becoming more and more unhinged prompts us to be a bit less US-reliant, and to seek partnerships with other countries, and to make our own country a bit more self-reliant.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I'm not worried you're worried⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  You’re replying to a lemmy.ml user, they almost certainly think pulling out of NATO and allowing Putin to continue his genocide in Ukraine is a good thing.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Plans to ban smoking outside hospitals and schools in England⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Fair enough