General News Thread

[kenny]

20 minutes ago, CornwallFox said:

Can I ask a genuine question? 

 

This is going to come across potentially as an attack but I'm trying to work out whether there's any truth in what I sometimes think, from somebody in the industry. So I'd be grateful if you look beyond what you might perceive as a bit attacking your profession as I'm genuinely interested in your thoughts.  - No attack here, see below.

 

It's just, I see guys doing basic building jobs earning amounts most graduates will never achieve.  - Correct. Its good that people that are often labelled as 'working class' are rewarded for their skills rather than average grads.

I see building companies sitting on swathes of land and only building an amount that allows prices to remain high.  - Yes and no. There is little point investing £250k to build a house that will not sell. Likewise landbanking is a way of offsetting tax in good years by investing in the future of the company. There are a number of poorly run housebuilders that survive because of their legacy landbank. Developers that have to buy sites to build on a just in time process find it much much harder to be profitable.

 

You also need to factor in the minimum 12 months required for planning, often much longer, so they need lots of sites at lots of stages to be able to keep a business going.

 

You sometimes come accross sites where the developer has taken so long to get planning a better opportunity comes up so they don't build out.

 

I see a wish to maximise profits on every home - which is how the private sector works in all industries so that isn't novel. - If we aren't making profit, why bother at all? Profit isn't dirty, its a reward for being sucessful and entirely necessary to protect a business when things go bad.

I see charges for upkeep in the form of ground rent. 

I see really, really poorly built new builds across the country. - This is a real misnomer. I have seen some dreadfully constructed new builds. By dreadful I mean built to building Regs which are a really high standard but outside of tolerance and with poor mistakes. These types of houses are relatively rare and housebuilders are very protective of their * ratings. They generally work very hard to put right their errors or perceived errors.

 

So my question, bearing in mind I've said all the above without any real knowledge of the industry so I'm willing to listen if I'm wrong - is any of the above good for the country? Given we need more housing built, should we trust private sector building firms to actually build quality housing at a fair price? Pretty much. Its private sector or nothing, could you imagine a public sector builder? Nothing would ever be finished. In terms of price, the quality of building goes up each and every time there is a change to Building Regs. Stealth taxes in the form of BNG, landfill & Building Safety Levy have been added that add more than £10k to a new build in tax. Housing associations rely on the value of a home on their balance sheets and are now struggling as homes are not always worth what they cost to build (more up north, think Burnley, a £225k house probably costs £300k to build). Land values are currently being suppressed to offset the increases which isn't a bad thing.

 

Long and short, I can't see a better system. 

 

[CornwallFox]

No idea why but my response has led to this - note to moderator, I'd be grateful if you could let this post as I really don't understand what the issue is. I've had post limits and now this despite filling my question with caveats to now read it as an attack. It's really bizarre.

[kenny]

14 minutes ago, CornwallFox said:

No idea why but my response has led to this - note to moderator, I'd be grateful if you could let this post as I really don't understand what the issue is. I've had post limits and now this despite filling my question with caveats to now read it as an attack. It's really bizarre.

IF the local authority could build themselves and we ignore the obvious deficiencies in ability and efficiency then I think the savings would be:

 

5-10% profit margin. (Most construction contractors have a lower margin than this, even if their target margin is higher)

 

Labour costs the same, assuming that the standard self-employed model was used rather than salaried employee model?

Materials the same.

Consultants the same.

Land the same assuming the LA would have the same years of experience in land buying that developers do. (they wouldn't)

Exempt from building safety levy, but not bng or landfill tax.

 

The cheapest and quickest way to bring properties to market is permitted development apartments in old office buildings. LA's should be looking at this rather than shoe-box houses IMO.

 

The projects would probably take longer so the 5% saving would probably be a loss.

 

 

Edited 28 January by kenny

[kenny]

15 minutes ago, CornwallFox said:

No idea why but my response has led to this - note to moderator, I'd be grateful if you could let this post as I really don't understand what the issue is. I've had post limits and now this despite filling my question with caveats to now read it as an attack. It's really bizarre.

Probably worth thinking as well, if you could deliver 20% under market value houses, then a £350k semi, becomes £280k which is still out of reach of lots of people.

 

You would need to be able to build for less than it costs to buy the materials without everything else to make it possible for everyone that works to get on the ladder.

[CornwallFox]

Cheers @kenny, appreciate your responses. 

Edited 28 January by CornwallFox

[leicsmac]

The discussion between Starmer and Xi boringly diplomatic, then. 

 

Good. A little more boring might not be a bad thing considering what "interesting" has led us to recently. 

[foxes1988]

3 hours ago, leicsmac said:

The discussion between Starmer and Xi boringly diplomatic, then. 

 

Good. A little more boring might not be a bad thing considering what "interesting" has led us to recently. 

100%.  Electing personalities doesn't work. They always end up incompetent ala Johnson Truss.  Boring prime ministers like Major, Brown, May and Starmer is what we need 

Edited 29 January by foxes1988
Scratch that Truss is just a lettuce

[Greg2607]

8 hours ago, leicsmac said:

The discussion between Starmer and Xi boringly diplomatic, then. 

 

Good. A little more boring might not be a bad thing considering what "interesting" has led us to recently. 

in "effectiveness" terms, I agree..... for all of his criticisms (and there are plenty that are valid)  Starmer has generally been relatively efficient at delivering what the manifesto said it would deliver. 

 

https://fullfact.org/government-tracker/

 

the problem with efficient technocrat..... is that whilst the government might be doing lots of good things, that will generally have a positive impact over the longer term.... 

 

The Farage Personality Cult are likely to blow him away at the next election. 

 

Our only real hope is that Reform have a fantastic set of May Election results and then people actually see how utterly inept they are on the ground (Leicestershire county council being a prime example) - maybe that will cause just enough people to have doubt about the snake oil on sale and vote differently at the next general election. 

[leicsmac]

45 minutes ago, Greg2607 said:

in "effectiveness" terms, I agree..... for all of his criticisms (and there are plenty that are valid)  Starmer has generally been relatively efficient at delivering what the manifesto said it would deliver. 

 

https://fullfact.org/government-tracker/

 

the problem with efficient technocrat..... is that whilst the government might be doing lots of good things, that will generally have a positive impact over the longer term.... 

 

The Farage Personality Cult are likely to blow him away at the next election. 

 

Our only real hope is that Reform have a fantastic set of May Election results and then people actually see how utterly inept they are on the ground (Leicestershire county council being a prime example) - maybe that will cause just enough people to have doubt about the snake oil on sale and vote differently at the next general election. 

I actually think that Reform might have a rough couple of years solely because, and if, they are unable to decouple their political style from that of the current US administration. 

 

That Trump and co are being utterly outrageous means any kind of association with them is so poisonous it can be damaging, which imo gives Farage a headache about how best to address that right now. 

 

That one matter might be enough to at least deny them a straight majority.

Edited 29 January by leicsmac

[Corky]

Have no fear you Labour doubters, the political panel at work believe they will be voted out this year.

[Wymsey]

Scary with the thought of others like him thinking of / planning such attacks..

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cdjnknm18mvo

 

Edited 29 January by Wymsey

[Fightforever]

7 hours ago, leicsmac said:

I actually think that Reform might have a rough couple of years solely because, and if, they are unable to decouple their political style from that of the current US administration. 

 

That Trump and co are being utterly outrageous means any kind of association with them is so poisonous it can be damaging, which imo gives Farage a headache about how best to address that right now. 

 

That one matter might be enough to at least deny them a straight majority.

Do you think this is connected to some polling showing them having a downturn?

[danny.]

6 hours ago, Wymsey said:

Scary with the thought of others like him thinking of / planning such attacks..

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cdjnknm18mvo

 

Why are Muslim converts always ginger?

[Voll Blau]

13 hours ago, Greg2607 said:

in "effectiveness" terms, I agree..... for all of his criticisms (and there are plenty that are valid)  Starmer has generally been relatively efficient at delivering what the manifesto said it would deliver. 

 

https://fullfact.org/government-tracker/

 

the problem with efficient technocrat..... is that whilst the government might be doing lots of good things, that will generally have a positive impact over the longer term.... 

 

The Farage Personality Cult are likely to blow him away at the next election. 

 

Our only real hope is that Reform have a fantastic set of May Election results and then people actually see how utterly inept they are on the ground (Leicestershire county council being a prime example) - maybe that will cause just enough people to have doubt about the snake oil on sale and vote differently at the next general election. 

Was thinking the other day how much of a state the roads seem to have got in recently on my drive to work. Must be a coincided said roads are in Reform-run areas.

[leicsmac]

7 hours ago, Fightforever said:

Do you think this is connected to some polling showing them having a downturn?

It's possible, but then it's possible there are other causes as well.

 

It's telling, however, that even Farage and whoever was speaking for him recently has had to go out and directly tell Trump that he's wrong on a thing or two. That's damaging for them. 

[st albans fox]

20 hours ago, foxes1988 said:

100%.  Electing personalities doesn't work. They always end up incompetent ala Johnson Truss.  Boring prime ministers like Major, Brown, May and Starmer is what we need 

Too many of the voting public think life is a tv show where they can vote off who they don’t like 

And seeing that it isn’t makes no difference next time around 

hopefully enough of us exist who don’t to keep the ‘people’s stockbroker’ away from day to day power 

 

[Lionator]

The problem with reform is that they’re obsessed with the past and have little to offer in the future. The future for them is offering a past that didn’t exist. 

[Mike Oxlong]

I quite like how Trump is bleating about countries that he has abused talking trade with China, particularly so when he is visiting there himself in the Spring 

 

Who knows, maybe Xi will gift the greatest President ever a made in China MAIA cap - Make America Isolated Again 

[Danizen]

30 minutes ago, Mike Oxlong said:

I quite like how Trump is bleating about countries that he has abused talking trade with China, particularly so when he is visiting there himself in the Spring 

 

Who knows, maybe Xi will gift the greatest President ever a made in China MAIA cap - Make America Isolated Again 

Belligerent cvnt says something belligerent and cvnty.

 

Same as yesterday, same as tomorrow and every day until the dementia finally takes him.

 

Edit - Donald Trump, not you!

Edited 30 January by Danizen

[bovril]

1 hour ago, Lionator said:

The problem with reform is that they’re obsessed with the past and have little to offer in the future. The future for them is offering a past that didn’t exist. 

I think the past that British right wingers lament the passing of mostly did exist, it's just they are not particularly honest about why that's gone away, or how and to what extent we can get it back. 

[Sampson]

The most depressing thing about Farage is he’s like that really cringey hanger-on in school who so wants to be with the in-crowd as one of the cool silicon valley American types.

 

You just know he’d bend over backwards to let Musk run riot with AI destroying half the country’s jobs and just lie down and let Trump walk all over him when he says he wants the Falklands, a united Ireland and wants to asset strip the UK for his own personal wealth.

[bovril]

1 hour ago, Sampson said:

The most depressing thing about Farage is he’s like that really cringey hanger-on in school who so wants to be with the in-crowd as one of the cool silicon valley American types.

 

You just know he’d bend over backwards to let Musk run riot with AI destroying half the country’s jobs and just lie down and let Trump walk all over him when he says he wants the Falklands, a united Ireland and wants to asset strip the UK for his own personal wealth.

The weird thing about Farage is how little he is held accountable for the big thing we're not allowed to talk about, which I can only assume is because our media class is all terribly embarrassed that it happened and that many of them supported it. 

[RobHawk]

57 minutes ago, bovril said:

The weird thing about Farage is how little he is held accountable for the big thing we're not allowed to talk about, which I can only assume is because our media class is all terribly embarrassed that it happened and that many of them supported it. 

The media in this country but in particular those of a right wing persuasion are an absolute joke. 

 

They contradict themselves on a daily basis depending on what fits their narrative that day. There is no discussion, no middle ground, no credit when it is due, they don't even report on the basis of fact these days. 

 

Scare monger, attack and lie. That's all they do and are a huge reason out country is so ****ed in the first place. 

[Jattdogg]

Demon lemon arrested. What a joke. Trump is worse than the devil.

[Trav Le Bleu]

I'm just wondering who the hell do Amazon think wants to go to the cinema to watch a documentary about Donald Trump's trophy wife, outside of the USA?

 

Surely going to be a massive turkey.