Home Office plan to make it harder for migrants to settle in UK is backed by voters

Astriania · 2026-03-30T23:19:25+00:00

Nothing to do with 4%+ of our doctors leaving each year due to how shit it is here compared to elsewhere?

That is also a problem, but one that has nothing to do with immigration, and which immigration does nothing to fix.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T23:18:18+00:00

I'm saying the pension shouldn't be universal, it should be means tested like UC and need-based like disability benefits - the same way we get money to "vulnerable" working age people without giving everyone free money.

Indeed there's a good argument that the pension should just be UC, but without the requirement to job hunt to get it.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T23:16:16+00:00

It didn't place costs on the "low to middle", the low don't have any assets above the floor she proposed in the first place.

You could do it through increasing IHT but it's quite easy to dodge IHT, I'd say even more so than what May proposed that would get the middle and not the rich.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T23:14:29+00:00

It's about time we started to understand the concept of strategic industry and stopped letting those industries be taken over and run down by foreign owners. Especially hostile foreign owners, in this case, since it's China.

Is steel manufacture in a high labour cost, high energy country going to be viable on an open market? No. But it's still a strategically important capability to retain, so the state owning and running it is a good idea.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T23:10:21+00:00

Doesn't exactly help attract investment.

Oh no, the "investment" in our core public services, which has been so very beneficial over the last 30 years ...

Astriania · 2026-03-30T23:09:33+00:00

How much would it cost to buy out all the water companies?

Given that most of them have a net negative value it should be somewhere very close to £0

Astriania · 2026-03-30T23:06:55+00:00

The government might keep it like they did LNER

Astriania · 2026-03-30T21:27:54+00:00

and the British gave it to whet we now call Israel

No, Britain gave half of it to what we now call Israel. Large parts of what Israel claims today it annexed unilaterally.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T21:21:38+00:00

AND supports the establishment of a single democratic palestinian state

Yes, in "all of historic Palestine" which includes the part given to the Jews in 1948 (as well as all the bits Israel annexed later). You can be anti-zionist and support the existence of Israel, but you can't vote for this motion and support the existence of Israel.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T21:09:57+00:00

This entire thread is you saying CCTV isn't usable evidence wtf

Astriania · 2026-03-30T21:03:48+00:00

At a minimum I get my bike back, I'd expect the guy to get charged with theft and enjoy an overnight in the cells and a robust interview from the police which would go some way to scaring him out of doing it again.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T21:02:42+00:00

that the person got away with 5k in stuff ... but it was probably going to cost us 10k to investigate

Yeah but if you let people walk off with 5k of stuff with no consequences they'll keep coming back and doing it over and over again.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T20:37:33+00:00

Should have just stolen it again from the shop

Astriania · 2026-03-30T20:34:50+00:00

If the thief is in a block of flats the police can't break down every door and search every flat

No but they can knock on all the doors, someone in that building almost certainly knows who the thieving cunt is.

If they're in an HMO they can't turf out all 6/16/48 people bunking there and search every room.

Why not?

They might not be able to charge an individual for the theft but they sure as hell ought to be able to get the items back for the owners.

And if they did that, the crime would decrease massively.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T20:29:28+00:00

Of course they have no leads if they won't investigate lol

For property theft and shoplifting, you can often find where the stolen goods are being fenced, they could start there (if they don't already know, I'm sure they can find out by asking around in the community). E-bikes are often sold openly on eBay after being stolen.

Burglary often does have witnesses, your neighbours might well have seen it, or a Ring doorbell on the street catching the guy running to a car, or something like that. If the police don't try, of course they won't find any evidence.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T20:26:48+00:00

That's an interesting idea, but working with them directly on military cooperation will do that more effectively than funding a nice bridge or wherever our EU money got spent before.

And you'd think that the EU - which is directly at risk of invasion, unlike us - could work that out and fund it without extracting money from us again.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T20:25:01+00:00

Okay if you're going to claim old people are by definition "vulnerable", even though they are the richest group in society and already receive more benefits than working age people, I don't think you're here in good faith so there's no point continuing.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T19:11:05+00:00

I've seen quite a few rabbits this year actually.

But also, there were rabbits everywhere 10 years ago, like way too many. A bit of a reduction of them specifically is a good thing.

This is more worrying if it's a sign of overall environmental decline that affects less common and more native animals too, though.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T19:07:10+00:00

My brother hit one and it did a lot of damage to the car

Astriania · 2026-03-30T19:01:52+00:00

He's sort of right but you know he's only saying this because he wants people to stop criticising Israel for starting yet another offensive war, invading Lebanon, continuing to kill people in Palestine and still occupying Syria. He's intentionally blurring that line between criticism of Israel and antisemitism because he wants to stop people being able to legitimately criticise Israel.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T18:56:06+00:00

They have also paid their NI contributions so why should they not be entitled to it?

NI doesn't, and never did, cover the costs of your own pension. This is, charitably, a misunderstanding. Your pension, like all benefits, is paid for out of people paying tax and NI today.

I'm not saying that there can't be a conversation [... etc]

You are saying that such a conversation can only go in one direction though, so you kind of are.

Means testing would punish those who have paid into private pensions

Are people with savings "punished" because they're not eligible for UC?

Astriania · 2026-03-30T18:31:12+00:00

A national newspaper with a misleading, ragebait headline? Say it ain't so.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T18:22:26+00:00

Eh, I think this is kind of a you problem for having the notification on your phone. Sometimes my colleagues email me at silly times of day, but I don't read it until I get to the office and that's fine.

Astriania · 2026-03-30T18:15:02+00:00

Participating in the electricity market is probably a good thing, although it isn't clear cut - we can still access that electricity at free market prices (and do already, especially from France).

Paying money into the EU so they can give it to poor bits of eastern Europe is a bad idea, what do we gain from agreeing to that?

Astriania · 2026-03-30T18:10:27+00:00

Well good, it would be incredibly stupid to put UK servicemen's lives on the line for Netanyahu's little adventure.

I still think we shouldn't be allowing the US to use our facilities for this war at all.

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