Burnham’s idea of devolution contradicts the centralising measures the Labour government have been taking to drive through more housing, more accommodation for illegal arrivals, more wind arrays and solar farms, more grid pylons, less food growing. I bet he does not reverse those measures, as Labour struggles to impose more housing and net zero developments on a population that wants better control of our borders and fewer unreliable energy installations gobbling up farmland. Indeed, with his passion to build 1.5m homes with more emphasis on Council housing he may well need to intensify the override of our local Councils in his futile attempt to reach this unrealistic target.
Many of us would like our local Councils to have the power to say No to the conversion of military facilities into large open settlements for illegal arrivals. We would like national government to obey our wishes to reduce substantially inward migration to cut the need for so many new housing estates. We would like our Councils to be free to decide how much housing development and where.
It is true there would still be risk of disappointment with some Green and Lib Dem Councils, but if they defied local wishes on planning matters more people would see the need to vote to put in a Council that did reflect local views.
We would like local and national government to get out of the way in many decisions people and companies could take for themselves. Planning often gets in the way of people and businesses improving their existing properties, whilst imposing large new developments and changes of use of public sector property that communities think go too far.
July 4, 2026
I see the Refugees Welcome Brigade are demonstrating against1,250 refugees being housed at Bicester because it will induce Faaar Rite protests.
Oh, the irony.
Lord make me chaste, but not today.
July 4, 2026
Pure hypocrisy as we have come to expect of the lefties. Leave the money and power with the people who made it not local politician who have generally just wasted or are wasting on things like HS2, net zero, the mad Covid net have vaccines, duff and pointless university degrees, piss poor defence spending, the dire NHS…
July 4, 2026
Some very depressing betting odds – next election result over all majority – the order is No over all majority circa 50%, Labour 16%, Reform 16%, (Tories only about a 12% chance), Restore, Greens, Libdims…
Next Chancellor Miliband (circa 50%) is also firm favourite over Mc Faddon, Cooper Balls, Streeting, Mahmood… god help the country the chance of a decent right wing government that can actually gain power and actually deliver and undo the vast damage done to the UK by Blair through to two Tier Kier and Burnham is very low indeed.
July 4, 2026
Good morning.
A further creation and expansion of the bureaucratic State.
July 4, 2026
The irritating guff one reads in the right-wing media about UK electricity costs needs to be called out
While the United Kingdom allegedly ranks among the costliest energy markets in Europe, it does not have the absolute most expensive domestic electricity. Across the continent, Ireland, Germany and Belgium consistently register higher household rates per kWh. Ireland grapples with high import reliance and isolated grid infrastructure, while Germany and Belgium face immense financial pressures from heavy network distribution fees and historical renewable energy surcharges. French, German and Italian industrial energy costs are heavily subsidised, especially French
The high cost of British electricity is driven by structural factors rather than a single metric. The UK relies heavily on “natural” gas for power generation. Under Europe’s marginal pricing system, the most expensive fuel needed to meet demand—usually gas—sets the wholesale price for all electricity, inflating the cost of even cheap wind and solar power.
To understand where the money goes, a standard UK household electricity bill breaks down into the following structural components:
Wholesale Energy Costs (45%): The raw cost of purchasing power. Wholesale generator profits fluctuate wildly based on global gas markets, though excess revenues face a 45% windfall tax.
Network Grid Costs (25%): Maintaining pylons, wires, and operating the physical grid.
Policy & Green Levies (9.5%) Taxes 5% – Standard domestic VAT.
Operating Costs & Net Profit Margin (12%): Out of this, Ofgem strictly limits the retail supply profit margin to 4% (roughly £35 annually).
Ultimately, the UK sits outside the absolute top spots for households due to regulatory price protections, even though structural gas dependency keeps bills punishingly high. How about you start telling the truth about it Nigel? It’s got nothing to do with net zero has it?
Reply Your figures show just how dear the green levies and extra grid costs are from having renewables. All the gas costs are the extra costs owing to the unreliability of renewables. If you have renewables you need gas back up. If you had gas on base load you would not need standby wind turbines. You completely ignore the ultra high business energy costs and taxes in UK which are closing down so much of our industry.
July 4, 2026
The Reform policy to house immigrants only in constituencies that vote for pro-immigration parties is surely the way forward. What could be more democratic than to get what you want?
July 4, 2026
We definitely need less government, both national and local. It’s not guaranteed to make our lives perfect, but the current trajectory is the route to a modern version of serfdom that will make useven look at China with envy.
The people who nowadays rise in politics and the institutions generally have a terrifying range of psychological disorders for people making decisions over our lives. Psychopathy, narcissism, cognitive dissonance, pathological arrogance, Machiavelliism..the full gamut of “Dark Triad traits”.
I think this is a world far removed from that of our kind host’s rise to government.
July 4, 2026
The devolution I would like is for towns and their immediate surrounding villages to become responsible for their own roads, housing and public facilities. Instead the trend has been to larger and more anonymous authorities like counties to take powers upwards, with local boroughs disappearing. The police are on a similar trend.
July 4, 2026
I, and no doubt millions of Brits, cannot understand why left-leaning governments of all colours appear to favour foreigners over their own citizens. It makes no sense to the electorate, as is demonstrated by the regular polls published in our newspapers. Yet these same governments disregard them and the people who actually get to vote, and press on with these bewildering policies that intensely annoy and aggravate the British citizens.
In these dire days of the cost-of-living crisis, charity surely begins at home? Although you won’t find it hard to find a lefty government official who still believes we can save the world. Why?
Hmm! LOL, probably, maybe, but at what expense to the people who pay their taxes here?
Unless we have real change here and return to good old ‘Britishness’ everywhere, we’re doomed.
July 4, 2026
We can safely say , I think, that more devolution will be his first Lie.
No way will he allow Reform councils to pursue totally different policies than the others.