Earl Aelfheah

Every politician says they’ll find loads of money cutting frivolous spending. Reform had their own ‘DOGE’ team at Kent council who were going to go in and save huge amounts’ of money. They disbanded very quickly having realised that the mountains of waste didn’t actually exist.

We do need growth and investment. But cutting spending, is the opposite of investment - degrading transport, increasing waiting lists, etc. The analogy of government spending as a household budget is a very poor one. Government financial management is probably poor, but every single prospective government says they'll find billions in efficiencies and then fail to find them. I don't believe there is as much waste as people think. We need to tax unproductive assets, raising money to invest in public services / paying down debt, (or else encouraging people to move their money in to productive investments).

I think one could argue that degrading public services / infrastructure is what's led to our current, slow economic decline. We've spent 14 years trying austerity, and it's proven counter productive to growth and productivity. A successful economy and society needs good transport, education and early intervention health care. On taxes, it depends how you target them. Tax funded spending may be a positive fiscal multiplier. Taxes on work aren't great, or when they hit the poorest (who tend to spend most of what they earn, boosting economic activity). We need a well designed wealth tax (on idle assets), and stronger measures to target avoidance.

Yes, they should clearly have been more honest on taxes before the election and not backed themselves into a corner. After 14 years of mismanagement and decline, they have to invest and at the same time start to bring borrowing down (otherwise they continues to be at the mercy of the bond markets). Continued cuts / degrading of public services is counter productive (a successful economy and society needs good infrastructure, education and health care). The single biggest thing they could do to immediately improve growth would be to rejoin the single market, but I appreciate that is difficult politically. So if you can't significantly boost growth short term, can't cut too much further, and need to raise money without borrowing, that only really leaves taxation. Of course, where best to target those taxes - that's the real question.

It's yet another example of his ongoing attacks on the free press.

The editing was clumsy and made it look like he said something specific, that he did not. That is obviously wrong, and the BBC have apologised and people have lost their jobs as a result. That said, the overall impression - that Trump repeatedly stated (and still does) that the election had been stolen, that he encouraged his supporters to march on the Capitol, that he repeatedly called for people to fight - in short that he inspired a violent insurrection - is entirely true. Trump used the word 'fight' 20 times. Whilst his speech was going on, his supporters chanted "Take the Capitol", "Invade the Capitol", "Storm the Capitol" and "Fight for Trump" The documentary generally, was not misleading. The real scandal is that Trump wasn't tried and ended up back in power. I do think that we need to stop normalising Trump. He has a criminal history and is openly corrupt. He has shown himself to be a threat to democracy. The US right and their tech billionaire allies are having an malign impact on UK politics and culture, interfering both directly and indirectly, in ways that we should be doing more to challenge.

Totally agree with this. The pavement widening that was put in place during COVID, should have been made permanent imo. I would also make the bus lane 24/7. At the moment, it's nearly always got cars parked in it. Widening the pavement and removing some of the parking opposite the bus stop would also improve traffic flow.

Sounds like a sensible proposal

Really interesting discussion here. It's difficult to respect the views of people who support Farage, Trump, Musk etc. Why should we, when their views are deplorable. But then that exact 'deplorable' label, as we know, is counterproductive and drives people to double down / switch off to more progressive views. How do you actually help change minds? We're currently spiralling into dark places culturally and politically imo. The amount of open racism, even amongst front line politicians here and in the US is astounding to me. Feels like we're going backwards. The influence of social media and the tech billionaires / bros, is a powerful and largely malignant one. There was an enlightening (and frightening) bit of journalism by Sky this week about Musk's influence on British politics. He has a strange obsession with the UK and London in particular (as do many on the US right wing): https://news.sky.com/story/the-x-effect-how-elon-musk-is-boosting-the-british-right-13464487

Except you have no evidence for this. Calling people you disagree with lobbyists, or saying that they work for the council is just a way of trying to delegitimise what they may say, without engaging with it. It is not good faith debate. And it's ironic, that for all your dismissal of people's opinions as being those of 'lobbyists' with an agenda, you're quoting the AA as though they're an independent source - they are an actual lobby group that campaigns on behalf of motorists. You can have legitimate differences of opinion, or put different interpretations on things, but that's different to stating things that are just false. For example, saying that a street is now more dangerous for pedestrians, when pedestrian collisions and injuries have fallen, or that pollution has increased, when it has actually fallen - those things are demonstrably untrue. That is misinformation. You can have your own opinions, but you can't have your own facts. Arghh - he drew me back in 😉

They're not wrong to blame the previous government for leaving a mess. But they made stupid promises on taxation, which made it impossible for them to fix things. They should never have made those promises, but having done so it would be stupider still not to correct course imo. Breaking their manifesto pledge is the better of two bad options. More austerity / cuts to services just aren't going to wash with the public. They have to raise money in the short to medium term.

After being prosecuted, their faces often turn rouge

There is a great fireworks event every year in Battle. A bit like the Lewes one, but slightly smaller / more manageable. It’s not just you. Definitely seems to be a bit more subdued this year locally

It’s either cancel a Christian holiday or remove the flags and surrender to the wokerati in one Kent village. What a terrible bind for the reform types 🤣 https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/nov/03/beyond-ironic-reform-led-council-says-flags-must-come-down-so-christmas-lights-can-go-up

Old article, but suggest that Southwark has, at least in the last, been relatively good at pursuing rouge landlords https://www.londonpropertylicensing.co.uk/southwark-council-take-most-landlord-prosecutions-london/#:~:text=Southwark – 131 prosecutions (3 civil,data on civil financial penalties)

Totally fair Sue. My apologies, got drawn in again 🤦‍♂️ 🤣

That’s great. Yes, let’s hope it wasn’t at taxpayer’s cost

But it didn't. We have air monitoring data that shows that pollution dropped. Your 'it must have done' assumption can be (and has been) objectively tested and is objectively wrong. This is just completely untrue. You've said the LTN increased pollution. Just two examples are quoted above (see your comment on 12 Sept).

If you’re referring to the implementation of the LTN (?), the modelling done pre-implementation (commissioned by the council) forecast a reduction in pollution. The pollution monitoring post implementation has shown significant improvements in air quality. If you want to winge about your fine for another year, please try and at least keep it to this one thread so that we don’t have to keep hearing about it across the whole section.

You're quite wrong. You're actually just demonstrating your inability to ever accept an error. You've made statements about pedestrian safety, pollution and crime - All of which there are good data for and which demonstrate those claims are objectively false. You've deflected from the topic again on this thread, by first misrepresenting something I said, and then using it to re litigate all this other nonsense. And why? Because you've spent nearly a year refusing to accept any responsibility for a fine that was issued quite properly.

That is not true. You’ve actually suggested that the LTN has made pollution worse more than once. But in a couple of examples I can be bothered to find, you said: and... The air monitoring data is clear that pollution has massively improved. So this is simply not true. On road danger at the junction, you did say the junction was more dangerous now for pedestrians than it was previously: But that's not true either. The data shows the opposite and this was pointed out to you. When challenged and provided with the data on both these claims (and others you've made) demonstrating that they are objectively wrong, you've doubled down or deflected. And this is what you're doing again. The fact is that nearly a year ago you got a fine after being caught driving in a bus lane (or 'across a bus lane' if you prefer). This is easily avoidable. Yes it sucks. But you're just incapable of admitting error. It's always double down, deflect, claim conspiracy. It's so, so boring.

@Rockets If you want me to go back and dig out all the false and completely unevidenced statements you’ve made I can, but it’s very boring. Perhaps easier would be to simply ask where you’ve ever accepted a ‘mistake’. Just once? This is not true. Again, you’ve fallen for Rockets kicking up dust. Southwark publish figures for successful appeals annually. The admin error you’re referring to happened this year and is not included in the most recently published figures.

I’m not interested in re litigating this here. But this is not all you said on crime. And what about your claims about pollution?

Yes, it was clearly to do with the Dulwich LTN. It was the wider initiative that the LTN scheme was part of. The consultation (Southwark's largest ever) showed majority support for the aims set out under the ‘Streets for People’ strategy, which included things like improving road safety, reducing the amount of cut-through traffic etc. The LTN was designed to, and did, contribute to meeting those aims. You seem to think the consultations took the form of a single survey which amounted to a yes/no referendum. It is more complicated and has been discussed to death. And again: “The point is, and it's demonstrated again on this thread, that rather than ever admit an error, you double down or deflect. My one loosely worded comment - quickly clarified, is literally all you've got, and you have referenced it repeatedly, any time you're challenged on a matter of fact and don't want to admit having made a ‘mistake’. It's a bit sad.”

Nope. Read before you respond. He’s never going to marry you. Yes, it did go to appeal. The human judged that he was driving in the bus lane. You can actually read their response above! Again, they waive thousands, as previously pointed out. People defending Rocks refer to them as TF Hell on this thread, but sure, they’re both cool and awful depending on the point you want to make. I have not of course ‘celebrated each and every fine’, or any fine. But after almost a year of Rocks winging and spinning up conspiracy theories I am certainly not joining his embarrassing pity party.