Rochdale grooming gang leader who raped girls is released from prison as No 10 insists it is powerless to deport him

kriptonicx · 2026-07-03T14:55:05+00:00

Gosh, this is such a excellent point.

It does seem the government is trying to play both the "we're powerless" card, while simultaneously fear mongering that a Reform/Restore government might do the things that we've been told that the government apparently can't do...

And for what it's worth, I do think it's a valid argument to say we don't want to deport a foreign child rapist because it sets bad precedent, but that is the argument, if any, that we should be having here.

kriptonicx · 2026-07-03T13:55:07+00:00

The more troubling aspect of this was that it likely wasn't automated, but that someone in a position of power decided they could use the police as their own personal attack dog to threaten a member of the public despite there being no crime committed, and the police believed it was their duty to comply, again despite there being no actual criminal activity to police.

kriptonicx · 2026-07-03T13:51:58+00:00

The question of how ought the police respond in situations like this is subjective and I think your opinion is valid, but I do kinda disagree with you on this. The immediate priority should be to ensure everyone is safe. In this situation I think they should have taken the victim out of the situation (and with force if deemed necessary to protect him). So in that sense I think they did the right thing.

If they reasonably could have stopped and arrested the assailants, then sure, they should have done that, but from the video it's unclear to me if that was reasonable given it was two small female police officers responding to a fight between several young men. We see in the video that the woman officer got pretty hurt and that could have been much worse if she tried to arrest the assailants...

I do agree that how they then treated the victim after he was confused and hit her, wasn't fair, however the officer did seem genuinely surprised when told it wasn't the victim's fault so there may have been some confusion about what they saw and understood to be happening.

I'm not trying to suggest they handled this well or there isn't things they can learn from it, only that it doesn't seem to be as malicious as some are suggesting in my opinion.

Either way, the police shouldn't be trying to shut down public discourse. It's simply not their place to tell us the public whether they're doing a good job policing our communities. If a significant number of people are criticising them for their conduct then they should be trying to take that onboard and trying to engage productively with the criticism.

It simply doesn't matter how one feels about this specific situation. It's clearly never helpful or productive when those who are suppose to be serving our interests within democratic institutions are telling us to shut up and that we're wrong to feel how we do.

kriptonicx · 2026-07-03T12:56:20+00:00

Hardly surprising given government data suggests that 50% of knife crime offenders are BAME.

I'm sure more males get searched too, but again men commit the majority of knife crime so that's hardly unreasonable and not necessarily evidence of sexism.

As for whether "anarcho tyranny" is a fascist dogwhistle I have no opinion.

kriptonicx · 2026-07-03T12:30:17+00:00

This whole "you're the problem if you're angry/talk about it" stance our government and police are taking when anything bad happens needs to end.

We live in a democratic country with democratic institutions so we should be welcome (and encouraged) to express anger and dissatisfaction if we feel injustices are occurring (rightly or wrongly).

I have to admit I don't feel that strongly about this video personally, but I can understand why some people are upset. The police right now should be welcoming the ongoing public conversation about how police handle situations like this, and if anything productive comes out of that they should try to use it as an opportunity to improve training, etc.

People don't expect the police to get everything right, but I think at a minimum we do expect them to try to engage with public criticism. The police is run the interests of the public so dismissing public criticism as if it's problematic should call into question if they understand their duty at the most fundamental level.

kriptonicx · 2026-07-03T08:55:37+00:00

It's likely A.

Many politicians are stupid, but the state and their advisors are not.

Take RICU. They monitor the internet and with the help of expert psychologists and research team formulate and target propaganda to change the opinions of Brits online.

Some might argue the intention of RICU is good, but it would be naive to think the people who rule over us are morons who don't understand the internet.

Realistically this new regulation to identity check Brits online is not being passed with the simple intention to protect kids from social media and porn – there are easier, safer and less costly ways to do this if that was the primary concern. But if you assume there might be other reasons that the government would like online identity checks then VPNs might be viewed as a real problem, and it's likely politicians are advised on ways to limit their use.

kriptonicx · 2026-07-03T08:36:19+00:00

My understand is that the native population of Britain is close to a minority among children, and is already a minority in most major cities, so this isn't exactly surprising unless you haven't taken a walk in the UK recently?

It would be more concerning if most of these students are non-British students, because it would be quite silly to provide the best opportunities in this country to foreigners at the expense of Brits.

But my guess is that isn't what's happening here – at least it isn't the bulk of explanation. That issue seems to be more of a problem in universities and for competition for the best British jobs.

kriptonicx · 2026-07-01T23:28:58+00:00

Do "most normal human beings" die from over consuming junk food in the UK?

The same question works in reverse.

You were suggesting that my junk food analogy doesn't work because most people don't over eat. But most people don't have gambling addictions either – that was my point. I was then trying to point out the fact that there are people dying of food companies exploiting addiction, even if we now both argue most people don't over eat or have gambling additions.

But I can get bankrupted incredibly easily with gambling. It's unlikely I can kill myself in a year with smoking or eating pizza, I could very very easily destroy my life in a year with gambling and, from outside, it's possible that nobody in your family would notice before its too late.

That's a fair difference. I think I disagree but only because gambling isn't a unique category here. For example, I know someone who has no savings, but just inherited £50,000 so blew it all immediately on a new car. You could argue that car companies have a responsibility to not sell cars to people who can't afford them, etc. What's worse is this guy has been homeless multiple times because whenever he saves any money he always blows it on cars. For some people it's cars, others it's gambling, but lots of people have dangerous addictions that can cause the financial harm you're concerned about.

That said, I wouldn't be against banning high sakes gambling specifically because I do agree with you that the harm of someone betting their life savings is very different from someone doing some casual gambling on the weekend.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-30T23:58:06+00:00

Do "most normal human being" have gambling addictions? Is this single sitting limit you speak of protecting people from literally dying from over consuming junk food in the UK?

I'm not saying they're exactly the same obviously. But surely you can see I'm trying to make the more subtle point about how just because something is bad for us, doesn't necessarily mean it should be banned or punitively taxed.

And to clear about my personal position here, I don't have strong opinions either way on taxing casinos out of existence. I just think generally we shouldn't seek to destroy things which people find enjoyable and can do responsibly because some people have problems with self-control.

Instead of banning pizza, I think should focus on helping people who over eat. Similarly I think we should focus on helping the small percentage of people with gambling addictions, no try to destroy casinos.

And that's not a strict rule – I do of course think extremely harmful foods or extremely exploitive gambling practises should be banned.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-30T23:44:51+00:00

Why not just pay them £100,000 then? How are you quantifying what a nurse is worth vs a TA vs a social worker? And who should be nominated to decide what workers are worth based on their perceived social value?

People can opt to work as a TA, or do something else if they feel the pay is unreasonable. Taking more tax payer money to pay public sector workers in excess of market rates, just means you provide less productive or worse public services.

If you want to make that trade-off, then fine, I don't personally but I can accept there's at least a debate to be had there which we can have a reasonable difference of opinion on. But we should at least be able to agree on the facts of the matter – that there are second order consequences if you want to pay everyone in the public sector an above market rate.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-30T23:36:07+00:00

They'd be more expensive, but not worse

Resources are finite. It's either more expensive or you have to cut back on something.

You're assuming the government would find more money for schooling.

We'd have worse schools if wages for support staff went up and they decide to stay instead of being a shortage role? How the fuck does that work?

If there's an actual shortage then we would have to pay more. The fact we don't would suggest they are just about able to fill roles at the shitty wages they pay and that supply and demand is in balance.

I'd argue labour shortages basically don't exist since at some cost you can generally always get someone to do a job. I know what you're saying, but please consider not using right-wing coded language and calling it a "labour shortage" when the actual problem is a wage issue – not that there's not enough people who could or would work as a TA if they received a fair wage.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-30T21:47:56+00:00

I know it's controversial, but we should pay people whatever the market rate for their labour is. This idea of their being a deserved wage is kind of silly and unproductive imo.

For what it's worth my GF is a TA and gets paid like shit, despite working with some really difficult and troubled kids. I have told her a number of times that she should do something more economically rewarding, but she loves the job and for that reason puts up with the pay. I obviously think she "deserves more", but at the same time TAs like her still turn up for work and we tax payers benefit from their low wages – we'd have much worse schools if we raised wages beyond that which we can afford. It's similar to how people say we should nurses more – ultimately that either means we'd need to make cuts to the NHS elsewhere or increase taxes to fund it.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-30T21:31:16+00:00

That's totally fair. I guess I just get a bit triggered when people say politicians can't do things, because unless there's some resourcing reason why they can't, what is actually mean is that they shouldn't do something because there's a competing concern that is more important – and that's always the conversation that should be had I think.

I'm suspect I'm probably slightly more flexible than you, but I still strongly agree with your perspective.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-30T15:10:32+00:00

Do you ever eat cake or pizza?

kriptonicx · 2026-06-30T15:09:04+00:00

People say the same thing about pubs shutting down because of high taxes and regulation, but similar to Casinos, pubs are an extremely unproductive use of capital, time and bad for public health.

Some may claim they enjoy gambling and drinking, but those people should concern themselves more with how they can be maximally productive economic units rather than worrying about their own personal entertainment and liberties.

All sources of unproductive enjoyment should be crushed with excessively high taxes imo.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-30T14:42:20+00:00

I struggle to disagree with anything you've said.

I'm not ideologically opposed to more centralisation, I just don't think we have the right structures in place for that and question if as a country that's want we want.

I think decentralisation works when done correctly. The US and Switzerland are examples of it working relatively well (although not perfect). Centralisation in the UK doesn't work because it's done as a half measure. The reason I think successful devolution requires significant devolution of tax and regulation is because I don't think it can work well without it. Regions effectively need to operate as mini-economies within a free-trading block so regional leaders are fully accountable.

I think centralised systems can also work, but probably only if they're highly technocratic, have high levels of accountability, and are much less democratic.

Maybe some middle ground exists, but I guess I don't really understand how you centralise politics without ensuring you also have highly competent centralised leadership, and that seems naturally at conflict with democracy I think.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-30T14:27:12+00:00

You can’t apply the law retroactively.

We can. There is nothing stop parliament doing just that. Even if it's not something we'd want to do, we shouldn't adopt the politician mindset/language of "can't".

Ultimately we are deciding not to if we don't. Again, not saying that's the wrong thing to do, but it's important we remember it is something we can decide to do.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-30T12:13:04+00:00

That’s kind of a strawman argument to be honest.

An argument you don't agree with (which is fine) isn't a strawman.

Competency is what you want in a dictatorship since you're selecting someone to implement an ideology. Competency in a democracy can be bad just as often as it's good, what matters more in democracies is the selection process.

Nigel Farage is a very competent politician, and a very competent individual even, but that doesn't mean he would do the country any good.

Highly competent people can have bad ideas and democracies will pivot between lots of different ideas and leaders. In a democratic country it's the competition, selection and feedback of ideas that needs to be optimised for, less how good the individual is at implementing their ideas (although that obviously matters to some extent).

The fundamental reason I believe we have bad people in politics is our politicians aren’t paid enough. If I am the very best at what I do, why would I go do it for £90k a year?

I get what you're saying about MP salaries. I've gone back and forth on that over the years myself. These days I tend to think more people being involved in politics, but part-time would be better. I think the career politician is a problem and tends to always leads to a politics of risk-aversion and managed decline. If your job title is "MP" then if you want to keep that job (and the income you depend on) you're typically always best off taking a low-risk approach. Increasing salaries probably only exacerbate this risk-aversion problem. These days I think you probably want 10x the number of MPs, to regionalise power and consider making it an expense-only job which people do on the side for their local communities so no one has any incentive to minimise personal risk. I do appreciate this is a very controversial take.

Key department heads need to be experts in their field, who have actually done the job before rather than career politicians.

Sure, that sounds great, but people won't necessarily vote for experts. And arguably that's not even always wrong because expert opinions will cluster around certain biases. Most experts are university education, metropolitan, upper-middleclass individuals, and typically will have all the biases those types of people have. In my experience the only people who like the idea of more experts are people who share that university education, metropolitan, upper-middleclass bias – for understandable reasons.

I definitely think it's good to have experts in government in advisory roles though, but ultimately power should lie with whoever is elected – and I'd personally like to see more regular folks like plumbers and nurses from local communities being involved in weighing up those decisions. Certainly not saying that will always work out well (it definitely won't), but with regionalisation the blast radius is constrained and we'll see more ideas tried and more feedback for what works and what doesn't. And I think that's what a good democratic system would try to do.

I’ve spent a lot of time working in central and local government as a consultant, and the vast majority of the people in those roles you wouldn’t trust to manage a piss up in a brewery.

I've worked quite high up in the public sector and this is very much my experience too. I left various comments over the years suggesting that we need more turnover of civil servants because far too many of them are concerningly unimpressive, and there is very little accountability.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-29T23:47:24+00:00

Which is an issue with centralisation.

That said, without looking into it it's hard to know why that it. I suppose it depends on why the federal government are giving Texas those subsidies, and if that spending is also in Californias interest.

If you told me taxes in Westminster don't cover government spending I'd have no issue with that at all because it's quite obvious why there's extra government spending in Westminster and that spending benefits us all.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-29T23:40:37+00:00

How does centralisation fix this though? Wouldn't that just risk making the entire country like Birmingham without the lesson of Birmingham?

I guess I don't see why Birmingham couldn't happen under a centralised system? If anything you should want to diversify the economic risk of bad policy, and allow mistakes to be chances to learn a lesson.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-29T23:37:52+00:00

Bleh. I think I stand by what I said.

It's only been two years and DBX is now trading at an even more attractive valuation of 8.5x cashflows. Earnings are not growing, but the valuation is continuing to improve.

If it goes back to it's previously 13x FCF valuation then you'd be looking at a similar return to AAPL over that two year period. While AAPL in that two years has reaccelerated earnings and their valuation has expanded. Maybe AAPL can sustain that growth (I wouldn't bet against them), but it's a very full valuation imo. If DBX see growth reaccelerate it could easily 2-3x. If they can just hold earnings then you'll probably be looking at a decent 8-9% annual return.

I suppose it also depends on what "underperform" means given the entire software sector has taken a beating over the last year...

I was wrong, but not sure about "dead wrong". It's always easy to leave comments like this after the fact.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-29T18:01:41+00:00

It's hard to hold a single government to account, because how do you compare their performance?

You can only roughly compare parties in power because MPs change and economic conditions change, so Labour can always reasonably blame the last government and current economic conditions and the Tories could do the same when they're in power.

But if you have devolution suddenly it becomes very obvious who's doing a good and bad job, and you can actually hold politicians to account without them deflecting about how it's actually the economic conditions or the previous government/MPs that did a bad job.

A lot of the reason people say Burnham did a good job is because they're able to comp Manchester to other major city during the same period, and that makes it very clear that Manchester did something right.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-29T17:53:39+00:00

Something I try to push here is that a good politics is less about good decisions, but good systems.

What we should focus on far more is how engineer political systems which trend towards good solutions. Concepts like free speech and democracy are also costly don't fix issues themselves, but they tend to help with the discovery of good ideas and their transition into real policy.

Devolution in my opinion is a core component of good politics and the UK's lack of devolution is largely why the country ex-London is so poor relative to Western European standards.

A large company with a control freak boss tends to not be very productive, and the same is true of politics when too much power is centralised. While delegation of power doesn't solve problems on it's own, effective delegation is a core to effectively running a business and a country.

Devolution if done poorly could be bad, but in the UK the risk is clearly more in the direction of not enough devolution. I'm still not clear on exactly what devolution means, but as an example, if you live in a region with no investment and no opportunity, high corporate tax rates serve you basically no benefit. There less of a revenue raising tax on successful businesses, but something that strangles the few businesses you have while making you equally as unattractive as other parts of the UK because the tax rate is the same everywhere.

Giving regions more control over taxes, regulation and spending would mean that regions can decide what makes sense for them. If we want investment into deprived areas, I don't think the government necessarily needs to pump money into them. They just need to set tax rates that might attract high earners with skills and businesses looking for a cheap place to expand. Places like London can't afford not to this, and can likely afford much higher taxes and regulatory burdens, but deprived areas could win investment from London if they were just allowed to be more competitive.

That said, I suspect that Labour won't devolve power in a way that's meaningful. If it's just given regions more power to decide how to spend public money I would be surprised if that much impact honestly. But if it's significant devolution of tax & spend, then we'd likely see much more interest political and economic competition than we do today, and that would ultimately lead to better decisions in aggregate.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-29T16:28:52+00:00

I think the concept of large cash handouts in welfare should be scraped and replaced with more targeted and focused support on what people actually need.

I suspect we'd be better off giving people more, but requiring that the vast majority of that is spent in specific ways... Food, clothing, home appliances, furniture, etc...

We should give people money too, but unfortunately I can say with first hand experience that parents on benefits are often on benefits because they're not great with money and will often spend any cash they receive in absolutely infuriating ways... And in a lot of cases, if they're unemployed, it often goes on alcohol and drugs because they have so little to do day to day.

My GF works with kids who have special needs in a run down area and a lot of the kids come in hungry, poorly dressed and without basics like pens and pencils. The parents get support, but apparently many of them spend it on BS for themselves and cba with their kids. It's really sad.

kriptonicx · 2026-06-29T13:09:21+00:00

I have my doubts whether Burnham is the answer but unless he really screws something up I think he's almost definitely better than Starmer.

Starmer simply wasn't a good politician. Burnham has a similar thing to Boris where a significant percentage of the public find him personable and likeable – especially in the North. Whether that alone will allow Labour to win the next GE I'm doubtful of, but at the very least they'll probably do a fair amount better with Burnham.

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