snowychap

1 hour ago, Davkaus said:

At £8 a can,

You mother-**** what?

7 minutes ago, Genie said:

He’s an electrician fitting phones in cells, I doubt he followed it up tbh. I will remember not to share insights of things seen behind prison walls in future because it’ll be deemed fake news by VT as they’ve not seen it themselves.

'Fake news'.

7 minutes ago, Genie said:

Again, what’s crap about that?

It's crap because it's the way and the basis on which you have chosen to present and justify your argument.

1 minute ago, Genie said:

 It’s more of a story if “inmates forced to eat cold food or go hungry”. 
Food arrives cold and is replaced. That’s the crux of it. 

What crap.

3 minutes ago, Genie said:

 

Maybe I misinterpreted your previous post.

Yep. Either that or you didn't understand it. I hope it's not the latter.

4 minutes ago, Genie said:

They have TV’s, games consoles and now courtesy of my father in law landline phones on their rooms. These are facts.

'They' have...

2 minutes ago, Genie said:

Where do I talk about what people deserve?

Nowhere, as far as I can see, which is why I didn't say that you did.

1 hour ago, Genie said:

They have TV’s, they have games consoles, the have pool tables and table tennis

If they have to spend 23.5 hours out of every 24 in their own cell, how much 'pool tables and table tennis' do they actually have?

How much 'fact' is the representation of 'fact' that people make.

This is a specific comment and doesn't even scratch the surface of the nonsense about what people deserve in prison.

England may return to terrestrial TV as Channel 4 closes on India Test series

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England’s Test team could be set to return to Channel 4 for their first live appearance on terrestrial television in more than 15 years unless either Sky or BT Sport submit a late bid for rights to the series in India.

The first Test of the two-month tour begins in Chennai on Friday and negotiations over UK broadcasting are still to be concluded, with the global rights holders, Star Sports, having held talks with Channel 4, Sky and BT. A source close to the deal in India told the Observer on Saturday that a contract has not yet been signed but added that the offer from Channel 4 is “compelling” and an announcement could come as soon as Monday if no further bids arrive.

...more

Enjoyed listening to this:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0958dyt

Quote

Harnessing the power of the conscious mind and calming our inner chatter. Ethan Kross is an award winning psychologist and neuroscientist. His fascinating new book is called "Chatter: The Voice in our head, why it matters and how to harness it." Chatter happens when the voice in our head starts spinning out of control. After going through an acute episode of chatter himself, Ethan experienced a eureka moment. He discovered a simple but powerful technique that can help wrestle back control of the inner voice when it starts going haywire. In this episode, he also explains the huge effect this pandemic can have on our internal chatter, and what we can do about it. Ethan talks about the power of nature and "awe", and finally explains why tennis great Rafa Nadal is so meticulous when it comes to his pre-point routines and lining up his bottles "just so" at the change of ends.

What is Article 16 of the Northern Irish Protocol – and what on Earth was the European Commission thinking? (Includes a copy of the now deleted proposed regulation.)

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After four years or so of chronicling the various self-inflicted unforced errors of the United Kingdom, and the better decisions at each stage of Brexit by the European Union, it is kind of refreshing to see the European Commission commit a pratfall.

Of course, this is a grave situation, and we should be terribly earnest, but still: it is salutary to be reminded that no entity is perfect.

That said, some partisans – this time for the European Union – will maintain that there was no error and that the European Commission was entitled yesterday to invoke article 16 of the Irish Protocol.

Unfortunately for such partisans, the European Commission did a quick reverse-ermine last night to un-invoke article 16.

This was quite the spectacle for onlookers at the end of what was, on any view, not a good week for the European Commission.

...

The known facts point to article 16 having been triggered – that is the most plausible explantation for recital 16 to the proposed regulation – but also point to the commission not having followed annex 7.

In the immediate political context of concerns about ‘vaccine nationalism’ and in the broader context of the border in Ireland after Brexit, it was an unwise move by the European commission.

(Though, as averred at the head of this post, it was also good to see that the European Union can blunder as horribly as the United Kingdom.)

Perhaps the European Commission now hopes that this mistake will fade and disappear.

Perhaps both sides will now take more care before even considering article 16 safeguards.

Or perhaps all this is, in effect, a dress rehearsal for the political crisis when either side does go through with invoking article 16.

Brace, brace.

1 minute ago, bannedfromHandV said:

That’s not true, at least not in Bridgend nick anyway, they have to go collect their food and take it back to the cells, I know this for sure.

 

How long did you get?

2 minutes ago, Mic09 said:

Has there been many reports about vaccine booking problems?

I haven't heard of any myself.

I wasn't meaning to suggest that there were problems and that I hadn't encountered them - just that I'd done it for her and it seemed to go absolutely fine and hoped that this augured well for the rest of the process.

Just booked my mother's two appointments for her vaccine doses via the NHS website.

Only issue was her first appointment time was taken by the time I got to the confirmation screen so had to choose another. If that's the sum total of 'issues' when dealing with the NHS booking system/vaccination process then that's all pretty good stuff.

30 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

though I don't want to mischaracterise

Not mischaracterised - it's certainly a big part of the gist of my argument.

57 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

Patel's response to the protests was, uh, something:

Pretty grim stuff.

Agree, grim.

20 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said:

I still think she will be their next leader

Quite possible and even grimmer.

1 hour ago, sidcow said:

It's not unusual for the BBC to quote Tom Jones. 

Edit:

37 minutes ago, TrentVilla said:

No, I’m not. Just pointing out that describing it as a UK dispute with the EU is inaccurate. Because it is inaccurate.

We're in a Clinton, 'it depends on what the meaning of the word [it] is' situation here.

I didn't describe 'it' as a UK dispute with the EU, I spoke about the conversation about a spat between the UK and the EU, i.e. the thing that went beyond the original catalytic event.

The poster to whom I responded had said:

Quote

the EU out of nowhere started highly emotive and inflammatory actions which were very clearly politically motivated to apply pressure on The UK and drug companies

thus elevating it from the narrow specific dispute that the EU may have had with AZ to something wider involving 'The UK'.

The EU had invoked and then rovoked Article 16 of the Protocol on NI which is part of the WA, a treaty between the UK and EU to which AZ is no sort of party thus, at least temporarily (and probably not just), meaning that it had long since ceased to be just a spat between the EU and AZ.

Plenty of people on here and elsewhere have responded to the spat making it more than simply an issue between the EU and a pharmaceutical company and therein lies a wider problem.

3 minutes ago, Awol said:

Trying to combat the disinformation campaign against AZ by French and German politicians, reassuring folks in the UK that it will protect granny - and here’s Tom Jones to prove it. 

Not sure if...

2 minutes ago, TrentVilla said:

There may pr may not have been UK input, fact remains it is at the heart of the matter a dispute between the EU and AZ not the UK and the EU. The EU have in the last 24 hours come close to creating one with the UK though.

I reiterate that I think this is massively missing the fundamental point but we're going round in circles, here, TV.

@HanoiVillan

More on Napier barracks from the Indie:

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A journalist has been arrested after taking and sharing photographs of activists protesting against the conditions in a controversial military camp housing hundreds of asylum seekers in Kent.

Freelance photographer Andy Aitchison, 46, attended a demonstration outside Napier Barracks, in Folkestone, on Thursday morning and took photos as protesters threw buckets of fake blood at the gates of the site. The images were later used in local press reports.

The protest, which saw demonstrators holding signs reading: “Close Napier now” and “There will be blood on your hands”, came in response to mounting concerns about poor living conditions in the barracks where more than 100 people have contracted coronavirus in the last two weeks.

On Friday afternoon a fire broke out at the site, which has been used to house around 400 asylum seekers since September, prompting renewed calls for the camp to be closed. The cause of the fire is as yet unknown.

More than six hours after the demonstration on Thursday, five police officers arrived at the home of Mr Aitchison, who has worked as a photographer for 26 years, and charged him with criminal damage of a dwelling.

...

Mr Aitchison said he was also frustrated at being banned from attending the site of Napier Barracks, where he has photographed a number of demonstrations since the site started housing asylum seekers in September.

“It does seem like a political thing. People have highlighted how bad things are there, and I’ve shared that with the world, and because of that I’ve been hit. It’s going to have an impact on me for the rest of my life, and for work,” he added.

...more

On a separate note, this kind of thing doesn't really help:

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Sir Tom Jones has said he feels "bulletproof" after receiving both doses of the coronavirus vaccine.

The Pontypridd-born singer, 80, first revealed he had his first jab before performing on Jools Holland's Annual Hootenanny, broadcast on New Year's Eve.

Now the singer has said "it's a great feeling" to be fully vaccinated.

He told The Graham Norton Show: "I've had the two and I'm now bulletproof!"

Surely that runs against the message(s) being run alongside the vaccination programme about not letting one's guard down, continuing to follow measures, &c.?

Yes, it's just Tom Jones but it is on the front page of the BBC's website.

39 minutes ago, TrentVilla said:

It isn’t for once a spat between the UK and the EU, that suggests the UK is in someway responsible when it clearly isn’t.

I think it stretches plausibility to think that there has been no input from the UK government in to decision making about supply by AZ.

Whatever the initial starting point for the issues (and I'll repeat the point that I view all of this in much wider terms than any one nation or group of nations versus any manufacturer/other nation/other group of nations), it has become much more than that initial problem because we're all interconnected - as people, as areas, as nations, as groups of nations, &c.

Problems that may start out very locally have a propensity (indeed, are almost certain) in an interconnected world such as ours to affect a much wider group than might initially be the case. Addressing global issues locally without a good overarching collective direction is probably not the best way of responding to these kinds of crises. Perhaps, even, these local responses create the kinds of tensions that bleed in to other areas and become long-term sores requiring lots of unnecessary diplomatic effort to resolve or come back to bite people on the arse or, worse still, lead to conflict.

6 hours ago, sidcow said:

Well YOU are the one who honed in on the comment "we ARE all in this together" and responded with the comment "there are plenty of posts in this thread that suggest this is not the case" so I foolishly assumed you meant us here on VT. 

I didn't 'hone ' in on a comment. I repled to something that another poster had said.

I inferred that @trekka's 'we' wasn't people on VT but everyone on the planet given the kind of poster he is. I may have been wrong. If I wasn't then I thoroughly agree with him and it goes to further reinforce my sadness at the parochial views being commonly expressed.

Even if I was wrong, your line about speaking on behalf of 'us here on VT'' would only work for a subset anyway, wouldn't it?

6 hours ago, sidcow said:

in terms of problems, I agree there are (or were) plenty

Nope, there still are and there still likely will be plenty. Even focussing on the spat between the UK and EU makes it somewhat of a parochial issue (and a vehicle for many to trot out well worn tropes rather than perceptive analysis) which rather ignores any other problems.