Palacegalleryratio [he/him]

That is very good

Ok. I did say “Britishness as it is today”, I never mentioned the far past.

To be clear, not that I think the past was good in Britain either, it sucked then too, just differently.

In the course of human history the creation of Britain and the concept of Britishness as it is today was a mistake. We shouldn’t have done it folks. It’s bad. This list shows a deeply sick society and culture. You’re right to be alienated, it’s deeply alienating.

Britain was a mistake.

Yeah. Got to be better. Also rather than banning this website, wouldn’t it be better to look into what is driving people to suicide? I’m guessing a lot of it is social, health and economic conditions that could be addressed by government if they truly cared and weren’t just moralising.

I suspect I’ve got a bad read on this, but I mean… if you’re going to do it, wouldn’t you want someone to do it with too? Companionship in those final moments?

Maybe ‘The Seventh Continent’ had the wrong impression on me.

This is disgraceful.

I am sure Labour under Keir is doing everything it can to lose my vote.

Profit must go up though. It’s the entire systems basis. Unless you want to change the system…

To add onto my previous reply, buying trains isn’t like you or I buying groceries or even the NHS buying pharmaceuticals. If you or I don’t like Tesco’s products or prices we can cross the road and go to Asda (or Morrisons or Aldi or Waitrose etc) with no consequences or interruption of supply at all for us.

Likewise for the NHS if they don’t like the terms for a drug from generic supplier A, they can buy from generic supplier B. And for many drugs produced as generics there are large manufacturers who are kitted out to do this at reasonably short timeframes with shortfalls from switching suppliers that can be covered from strategic supplies.

Trains on the other hand have working lifespans in decades (sometimes too many decades!). We don’t have spares just sat about as they’re hugely expensive assets, so if you want a different one you have to buy a new one. Buying new ones is a lengthy process that takes years for development, manufacturing, testing, driver training and modifications to infrastructure (power requirements, clearances, platforms alterations etc). You can’t be without trains either as the country requires the trains to run reasonably reliably for a huge amount of economic activity. So it isn’t a simple matter of deciding one is leaving of one train supplier and just going to another. So they kind of have you over a barrel in that sense. It’s a very poor negotiating position.

They kinda already do though. The government tells them what trains they can buy for which routes, and then tells them what they can charge. And they’re still drawing a profit today.

So the rail infrastructure (tracks, signals etc) is owned by network rail. The government tried having it run for profit by a company called RailTrack. However it turns out that rail infrastructure maintenance and the profit motive are not easy bed fellows and the profit motive part won out, and then Ladbrook Grove, Southall and Hatfield rail crashes happened due to railtracks negligent maintenance. So now it is run by the government owned and funded network rail. However Network Rail contract out most of the maintenance to other civils contractors to actually do the work.

The train operators compete to run trains on a route. They take revenue from ticket sales. On the route they are obliged to maintain a minimum service even on unprofitable lines (e.g. rural commuter lines), their reward for doing so is they get the profits from the productive lines e.g. intercity lines. However post COVID contracts have been restructured away from a share of ticket sales, towards a ‘cost plus’ system that is independent of passenger volume.

The trains and other rolling stock are owned by Rolling Stock companies and leased to the Train Operating Companies. This means if the government wants to strip an operator of its franchise they can without having to get the franchise to sell the trains to their successor/competitor, they just re-lease the same trains from the Rolling Stock Company. However mostly the rolling stock operating companies exist to extract value from the system and deliver it to shareholders, they add no value over if the trains were owned by network rail. It’s wild that that is the bit Labour doesn’t want to nationalise, it’s a pointless rent seeking middle man.

The Train Operating Companies run the stations in their regions (with some exceptions for the busiest, most important stations that are run by Network Rail) however the stations are owned by Network Rail.

I think she’s saying that those condemning the Sydney guy are hypocrites, for being the same people who also condemn Israel and in doing so making her feel unsafe in London as an Israel supporter. But it’s hard to say.

Also it’s not a very consistent position as she seems to be ignoring the reason why people take issue with Israel, I.e. opposing the genocidal violence Israel is committing against the people of Palestine.

That is very cool, it would make a fun project.

There definitely should be a good open source e-reader, but for what it’s worth I use a Kobo Clara 2e (newer models are available in both black and white and colour eink) and it works fine for me.

I download books from various resources; like Project Gutenberg and use Calibre for managing them. Works pretty seamlessly, especially with the Calibre Kobo plugin for automatic conversion to the kepub format too. However this obviously requires the use of a computer, which may be a dealbreaker. Also Kobo works well with Overdrive for borrowing library ebooks, which is neat.

I mean, good. He’s right to do so and I support his goal, these bosses should pay for their actions.

But I suspect he is going to find out the hard way which class of people the judiciary works for.

Fair, in my experience I’ve never found I couldn’t get a better deal, but I’ve also never used Tesco insurance.

Never take a renewal, they’re always a rip off. It’s just the insurance company preying on people who don’t look for other quotes.

What a fantastic election… You’d struggle to get a rizla between the gaps in their policy positions and both parties are supporting genocide in Gaza. Which means in this election your choice is: you get to pick the colour of tie of the guy who uses your taxes to support the massacre of civilians. Red or blue.

Great. Democracy in action. What an opportunity to steer the nation. I’m so motivated to go vote.

Weird but cool keyboard! I have a diy low profile ortholinear split, but have never set up tenting, I’d love to try it some time.

A low profile choc switch sofle