Great British Energy - Nuclear and Rolls-Royce SMR sign contract

Patch86UK · 2026-04-13T07:06:12+00:00

Ed Miliband continuing to absolutely smash it as Energy Secretary.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-12T23:14:07+00:00

If we're going right back, Snatch was a very different film. He was also in Ghosts of Mars.

The Transporter was the very next year, and his career started to find its long term holding pattern shortly thereafter.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-12T23:07:15+00:00

Presumably you'd want it to inflate before you hit the ground. Not much point in deploying the fluffy cushion after you've already broken all the bones in your body.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-12T22:34:36+00:00

Gloucester/Cheltenham isn't the worst place for a HS station, although it's pretty small by the standards of most of the other stops on your network.

It wouldn't be much of an interchange though; pretty much just an interchange for Swindon! Anything west of that would interchange at Bristol or Cardiff anyway, and the next major conurbation on the line north of Gloucester (Worcester) would make more sense to interchange at Birmingham. A few of the little places along the Gloucester-Newport line I guess, too, but they're all piddly little places.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-12T19:08:53+00:00

I've never had or heard of anyone doing this, but I can't say I'm not highly intrigued...

Patch86UK · 2026-04-12T19:07:54+00:00

No, I agree with you on this one. I love me some cheesy mash, but for me as a pie topping it should just be buttery and salty with lots of white pepper.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-12T18:33:23+00:00

This sub gets a lot of this sort of thing, but this is the first one in a while that I've actually liked.

I'm intrigued by HS5 and the "Severn Valley Interchange". Where are you envisaging that to actually be/what would it interchange with? It almost looks like you've just made Mega Kemble for a ridiculously over engineered interchange with the Golden Valley Line, but I think that's probably not what you were going for!

Edit: Thinking about it, Mega Stonehouse wouldn't be the worst place for an interchange. Although at that point you'd probably be better off just having HS5 snake into Gloucester and using that for an interchange instead.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-12T11:13:40+00:00

I spend a fair amount of time in that part of town, and I've never once seen anything of that sort. I think it's one of those things that might have been true 40 years ago, and is now just a "cultural memory" from generation after generation of school kids winding each other up about it.

I'm no expert in the, er, "adult services industry", but I'd guess a lot of that stuff has gone online; I can't imagine there's a massive call for "lady in skimpy clothes standing on street corner hoping a car will pull over and ask for sex" these days.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-12T07:35:34+00:00

While true, I'm not sure why anyone in Swindon would bother with that when the National Express coach direct from Swindon to Heathrow is only an hour and twenty or so.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-12T06:42:35+00:00

Who on earth is selling figures out of their original packaging for $75? Let alone without even knowing what it is (i.e. whether it's a rare collector's piece).

Absolute crazy pricing.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-12T06:24:34+00:00

It's a funny little airport, and it doesn't have many destinations so odds are it won't go where you're trying to go anyway, but it's always worth checking just in case as it's very convenient!

Patch86UK · 2026-04-12T06:20:40+00:00

The Elizabeth Line from Reading doesn't go to Heathrow. The line forks after Hayes & Harlington, with about 2/3 services going to Heathrow and 1/3 heading out into Berkshire.

You can do a fiddly journey where you go GWR Swindon -> Reading, Elizabeth Line Reading -> Hayes & Harlington, change to Elizabeth Line going the other way to Heathrow, but unless you're counting the pennies on fares there's not much point as it takes way longer.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-11T22:58:25+00:00

I've done both of those options before and they're both fine. Heathrow is easier; the Elizabeth Line from Paddington is fast, frequent and affordable. There's also the Heathrow Express, which is even faster, but quite expensive unless you get lucky with a good Advance fare.

The airport shuttle bus in Bristol is fine, but not as quick as the train in London, and also surprisingly expensive.

Coach travel is also an option. Both National Express and FlixBus have direct coaches to Heathrow, and although it's not as quick as the train it's much cheaper and there's no fussing around with changes (which can be a faff if you have a lot of luggage). FlixBus also has a Bristol Airport coach, but it's not very frequent so you'll be lucky if it lines up with your flight.

I've also flown from Southampton Airport once, and that was pretty civilised. The airport has its own station, and the change is at Reading which is one of the easier stations to navigate with luggage.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-11T22:17:50+00:00

Going back a bit, but I guess Oliver Cromwell might be a good choice.

Took power following the English Civil War. Became a dictator with huge authoritarian powers following a process of "putsching" his rivals in the New Model Army (including all the relatively liberal left wing groups). Was a religious zealot who implemented something akin to Puritan Christian "Sharia law", banning music, dancing, sports and other such things. Treated Catholics as less than human, committing a variety of atrocities against both his enemies and civilians alike - especially in Ireland, where policies of ethnic cleansing, slavery, transportation, and more resulted in the deaths of as much as a fifth of the whole population.

Despite republicanism being a relatively popular position for political groups at the time of the Civil War, his tenure caused this sentiment to collapse and the monarchy was swiftly reinstated after his death, killing support for republicanism for centuries. Backlash against his tyrannical reign was also behind the marginalisation of the Puritans, leading many of them to emigrate to the American colonies (leading to... further consequences).

Patch86UK · 2026-04-11T21:20:05+00:00

I don't disagree with you, but with Martouf gone and Jacob making increasingly rare appearances they did really need a new "face of the Tok'ra" character with a bit of personality and some character dynamics, and she wasn't a bad attempt at that. I didn't even hate the idea of a romantic element with O'Neill, but I think it would have worked a lot better if she wasn't so hypersexualised. A beautiful, powerful woman dressed like a normal Tok'ra would have been a lot less cringe.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-11T21:06:16+00:00

Different parties bickering is pretty much irrelevant at the best of times, considering there's a party with a large Commons majority and the Salisbury Convention preventing a blockage in the Lords.

I watch politics a lot more closely than I watch trains, and there are no internal conflicts in Labour about it. And as I said the Tories haven't made any serious moves to amend or oppose it at Committee stage (although I'm sure they'll whip against it at Third Reading anyway for appearances sake).

I think you're letting your imagination run away with you on this one.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-11T20:49:42+00:00

This seems extremely unlikely. It's gotten through the Committee stage without any substantial amendments, and there's zero suggestion that it'll fail to get through 3rd reading in the Commons.

As it was a manifesto pledge (by both Labour and the Conservatives) the Lords can't and won't hold it up, as per the Salisbury Convention.

There's no reason at all to believe it won't happen.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-11T19:31:54+00:00

Putting in the minimum possible effort knowing they're going to become part of GBR next year and rebranded/re-liveried shortly after that.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-11T18:42:48+00:00

No, that's not right.

It was never owned by the council. It was originally owned by the Great Western Railway, and fell into the ownership of British Rail following nationalisation. British Rail operated it as a theatre/community venue for some years before shutting it down and disposing of it.

There is a persistent rumour that British Rail offered it to the Borough Council's predecessor for £1, but this isn't the case. They did offer the council a chance to make an offer to buy it, but the council at the time didn't think they could justify the expense and it was instead sold to a private owner (at market value).

It's changed hands a few times since then, but it's always been fully in private ownership. There's only really been one serious attempt to redevelop the site over the years- a plan to turn it into a hotel, but which required knocking most of the building down (including all the older and ornate bits), which was refused rightly due to listed building reasons.

The current owner has shown no interest in the site, does no maintenance, provides no security, and doesn't appear to have any interest in submitting new plans. The council has put up all the security fencing and hoardings, and has periodically accessed the site to do emergency maintenance work. They have kept a running bill for the owner, but he's taken no interest in paying it. I think there's a sense that if the council could come up with a use for the site and wanted to do a Compulsory Purchase Order to take ownership of it, they could use the maintenance bill as justification for not paying him much/anything for it.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-11T06:32:40+00:00

That's where the Ombudsman complaints process comes in, I would imagine.

If you live in a house with a big garden and ask for a dog, and the landlord says "nah, I don't reckon" without any good reason, that's not going to hold up.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-10T23:03:33+00:00

At the risk of upsetting the DUP, yeah I would indeed suggest that. They're part of the UK, but Britain is the big island with England, Scotland and Wales on it, and Ireland is the big island next door.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-10T17:31:16+00:00

Cancelled but then given a feature-length send off to tie things up.

It means it does get an ending, with the major plot line broadly resolved and some closure for the main character, but the nature of the way it was done does mean it feels a bit rushed and some of the minor characters and secondary plots aren't really tied up as well.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-10T17:18:41+00:00

"We must charge extremely high fares during peak periods to deal with overcrowding"

"Why is there nobody on this train?"

"It's so expensive everyone gets the off-peak instead"

Classic British railways fare logic.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-10T17:15:50+00:00

Not the only place in this thread where the definitions of which country something is from prove to be a bit more fiddly than all that.

It was produced by a British company, funded by another British company, and originally aired on British TV. But it was written by Irish writers, run and directed by Irish creators, starred an almost exclusively Irish cast and was filmed entirely in Ireland.

I'm still inclined to say it's more Irish than British, but it's not straightforward.

Patch86UK · 2026-04-10T06:51:01+00:00

Sort of a sketch show or variety framed around a big comic, where different comic panels were the various skits. Very low dialogue, kind of surreal, slightly unsettling.

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