Lurked on here for a while. Unable to state reality without jeopardising career prospects, so relaunching. I know fine what a woman is. Quite fond of them.
@IndyLassie A they said "We're just asking staff to be mindful we have a diverse workforce and displays such as flags, team shirts or other football paraphernalia can sometimes be open to different interpretations or cause unintended offence".
@IndyLassie That's the "Progress" Pride Flag flying on the Midlothian council town hall in Penicuik, Midlothian. They'll allow that extremely contentious flag to fly, but not our national flag?
Norway and the UK drilled the same North Sea.
🇳🇴Norway got $2 trillion.
🇬🇧The UK got tax cuts.
Same basin,Same era.... Completely different outcomes.
Norway captured $30 per barrel in government revenue. The UK captured $11.
That gap, compounded over 50 years of production, is the entire difference.
Norway's model was simple: tax heavily (78% marginal rate), take direct equity stakes in fields via the SDFI, own part of Equinor, and put everything surplus into a fund invested abroad.
The Government Pension Fund Global now holds over $2 trillion in assets.
That's $390,000 per Norwegian citizen about 1.5% of all listed equities on earth.
The fiscal rule: only spend the 3% annual real return. Never touch the principal.
The UK started producing earlier, at lower prices, with a lower tax rate (40%) and no saving mechanism.
North Sea revenues flowed straight into the general budget.
Economists estimate the UK missed out on roughly £400 billion compared to a Norwegian style regime.
The windfall largely financed tax cuts in the 1980s rather than a fund.
Where things stand in 2026?
Norway's petroleum sector will generate $63 bn in net cash flow this year alone feeding a fund already large enough to cover 10-15% of the national budget from returns alone.
The UK is a net energy importer.
Since 2021 it has paid countries like Norway more than £100 billion for gas.
One country treated oil as a finite resource to convert into permanent financial wealth.
The other treated it as income.
image source:eia
@AwayFromTheKeys@JNHanvey The SNP are devolutionists. Devolution within the union. They are unionists. There are far more important things for them than independence.
A British school dinner in 1975 was cooked on-site, from whole ingredients, by a dinner lady who knew, without consulting a nutritional database, what a growing child needed to eat.
The dinner was: roast beef, gravy from the drippings, boiled potatoes, cabbage, and sponge pudding with custard made from eggs and milk. Or shepherd's pie from real mince. Or liver and onions. Or fish on Friday, battered and fried in beef dripping.
In a single sitting: haem iron from the meat, calcium from the custard, B12 from the liver, vitamin A from the gravy fat, vitamin D from the eggs, zinc from the beef, omega-3 from the fish, collagen from the gravy, complete protein from every component, and roughly 800 calories dense enough to carry a child through an afternoon of running around a playground in January.
Then the system changed.
In the 1980s and 1990s, local authority catering was outsourced. On-site kitchens closed. Dinner ladies were made redundant. Central production kitchens began manufacturing meals reheated in convection ovens.
The roast beef became a turkey twizzler. The shepherd's pie became a pre-formed disc of processed potato and reconstituted meat product. The liver disappeared entirely. The fish was coated in breadcrumbs and fried in vegetable oil. The custard was made from powder, water, and yellow colouring. The sponge pudding was replaced by a yoghurt tube.
Jamie Oliver's 2005 campaign filmed children who could not identify a tomato. Kitchens where the only equipment was a deep fryer and a microwave. Menus that contained less nutritional value in a full week than the 1975 dinner contained in a single sitting.
The government pledged reform. But the on-site kitchen did not come back. The dinner lady did not come back. The roast beef and the liver and the custard made from eggs did not come back.
The 1975 dinner lady, who had no nutritional qualification and had never heard of a DIAAS score, was producing, at approximately 30p per serving, a meal that contained more bioavailable nutrition than anything the modern system produces at three times the cost.
She has been replaced by a supply chain.
The supply chain is more expensive.
The children are less well fed.
The dinner lady knew what she was doing.
Nobody asked her.
@BiblicalBeauty So, an omnipotent power killed the Mum, has stricken one child with a terrible disease and left the other child in despair, but has got someone to send them a hot water bottle and a toy? Is this a good thing? How are these children now?
@BloodybushEdge@Iain_L So the system right now was partially funded by us, but we get absolutely no benefit of that if we leave, because it is all in England? They've stolen our money, haven't they? What's sick is that you're applauding it.
@Iain_L@JohnDun29970028 Aye, paying another nation to run them all would be crazy! That way they'd get all the economic benefits of these jobs and we'd just be giving out money to people that think we're idiots!
@Scotlandteam Discipline is a coached facet of the game. Turner hitting a ruck without wrapping, Gilco hitting the back of a ruck (?!). Toonie's had years to set those standards. The same Turner short line out fail. The coach needs to ensure they have a plan B to avoid the forward pass. Fail.
@JNHanvey promotion of the loyal inept, determination to maintain power in the hands of a few, party before country, wilful blindness, dangling carrots,supine leadership out front & pulling strings, highjacking a movement for self-interest & general lack of respect & accountability.....
@GallIain@AndrewCoventry9 She was paid a lot of money to foster a successful service and make key decisions. She clearly failed spectacularly on both counts and should be held to account. Allowing people in power to act with impunity only ever leads to abuse. This damages us all.