Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Valmy]

Ireland and the UK have a major housing crisis but they have only a tiny number of apartment dwellers. What a weird and totally correlated coincidence.

[Sheilbh]

Yeah. Although maybe the more interesting question is why the Netherlands and Belgium don't have major housing crises? Especially for Ireland which has far lower population density than England, or Benelux countries.

I'd guess it's more to do with the stuff that's mentioned in that Economist article - I know the supply side/YIMBY circles normally point to the Netherlands especially as a model on this.

[Josquius]

I'm pretty sure the Netherlands does have a housing crisis.

Much of its new development tends to come from reclaimed land - you can only imagine the fit NIMBYs in the UK would throw at this happening near them.

[Zanza]

The Netherlands seems to have similar conditions as elsewhere. Too little housing, new construction below target, Amsterdam unaffordable and too much AirBnb, first time buyers priced out of the market...

[Sheilbh]

Much of its new development tends to come from reclaimed land - you can only imagine the fit NIMBYs in the UK would throw at this happening near them.

Although only 8% of land in England is actually built on. We don't need to reclaim land, we just need to build things

And I've no issue with building flats in built up areas or houses - the problem is all of them struggle to get approval.

[garbon]

Much of its new development tends to come from reclaimed land - you can only imagine the fit NIMBYs in the UK would throw at this happening near them.

Although only 8% of land in England is actually built on. We don't need to reclaim land, we just need to build things

And I've no issue with building flats in built up areas or houses - the problem is all of them struggle to get approval.

I also wonder to what extent we should blame developers who fuck about.

My area in London has tons of new builds going up. One area though that has languished for a long time is a patch in the 'town centre' where original plans had a 28 story building proposed (with a terrible desing to boot). Not surprisingly there was a lot of resistance to that as it would have been a major eye sore way taller than any of its surroundings. Now nearly a decade later has been approved with new design and 15 floor height.

I can't say I fault the locals as while we need more housing, why would they want that?

[Josquius]

Much of its new development tends to come from reclaimed land - you can only imagine the fit NIMBYs in the UK would throw at this happening near them.

Although only 8% of land in England is actually built on. We don't need to reclaim land, we just need to build things

And I've no issue with building flats in built up areas or houses - the problem is all of them struggle to get approval.

In the Netherlands its not the lack of land as such but the agricultural sector not wanting to lose any land that makes the difference.
Though as said I can imagine a lot of people would be quite pissed off at suddenly not being right beside the sea, more so than they're already annoyed for taking over a local field.

[Sheilbh]

I also wonder to what extent we should blame developers who fuck about.

My area in London has tons of new builds going up. One area though that has languished for a long time is a patch in the 'town centre' where original plans had a 28 story building proposed (with a terrible desing to boot). Not surprisingly there was a lot of resistance to that as it would have been a major eye sore way taller than any of its surroundings. Now nearly a decade later has been approved with new design and 15 floor height.

I can't say I fault the locals as while we need more housing, why would they want that?

For sure - but I wonder how much of that is structured by the costs/hoops. Similar to the shrinking floor space of properties, I wonder how much of that is shaped by the overhead costs, legal costs, various surveys etc?

Also think the Economist point on land value tax makes sense (Georgism!) in terms of encouraging development - which would probably densify cities too.

Separately

Dame Cressida Dick 'felt intimidated' into resigning as Met Police commissioner and London mayor Sadiq Khan 'did not follow due process', report finds
London mayor Sadiq Khan responded to allegations of intimidation by describing them as "clearly biased" and "ignoring the facts".
Friday 2 September 2022 12:25, UK

Dame Cressida Dick "felt intimidated" into resigning as Metropolitan Police Commissioner following an ultimatum from London mayor Sadiq Khan, an independent report has found.

The review, by Sir Thomas Winsor, into Dame Cressida's departure from the force in February also found due process was not followed.

Dame Cressida said she would step aside after evidence emerged officers at Charing Cross police station had sent racist, sexist and homophobic messages to one another, and amid the fallout over the murder of Sarah Everard by serving officer Wayne Couzens.

Following the publication of some of the messages, Mr Khan said he was putting the commissioner "on notice", claiming an urgent plan to restore faith in the force and tackle prejudice was needed.

The report found the mayor was "particularly concerned" one of the officers who sent the offensive messages had been in the same team as Couzens.

He then said to her in private that this was her "last chance saloon" and she needed to "throw everything at this".

Announcing her resignation, Dame Cressida said Mr Khan "no longer had sufficient confidence in her leadership" and she was "sad" to be standing down.

The Met has since been placed in special measures.

Mr Khan's actions were criticised by several senior police figures at the time.

Sir Thomas presented his findings to the Home Office on 24 August, but they were published on Friday "given the public interest in the matter".

His report concludes: "Due process was not followed by the mayor of London and the mayor's office for policing and crime in their taking of actions which led, on 10 February 2022, to Dame Cressida Dick stepping aside as Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis.

"Those acting on behalf of the mayor told the commissioner that he intended publicly to announce his loss of trust and confidence in her, and that he intended to commence the statutory removal process, on the afternoon of February 10 2022.

"She felt intimidated by this process into stepping aside, and I can understand that reaction.

"The mayor's actions failed to respect the dignity of the commissioner as an individual, and as the holder of high public office.

"He did not act, in particular on 10 February 2022 itself, in accordance with the legislative scheme, still less its spirit."

Sadiq Khan claims report is 'biased'

Mr Khan responded to the allegations in the report, describing them as "clearly biased" and claiming they "ignore all the facts".

He added in a statement: "On the former commissioner's watch, trust in the police fell to record lows following a litany of terrible scandals.

"What happened was simple - I lost confidence in the former commissioner's ability to make the changes needed and she then chose to stand aside.

"Londoners elected me to hold the Met commissioner to account and that's exactly what I have done. I make absolutely no apology for demanding better for London and for putting the interests of the city I love first."

Home Secretary Priti Patel commented: "Public confidence in the Met has been dented by a series of appalling incidents and it is vital that failings are addressed and professional standards restored to the level that Londoners deserve."

Dame Cressida left her post in April and is due to be replaced by Sir Mark Rowley.

I mean FFS. I imagine she felt less intimidated than women attending the Sarah Everard vigil

Basically it's constructive dismissal but it feels to me fair enough that if you're the Met Commissioner and there's a collapse of public trust and the force is placed into special measures on your watch for the elected mayor to say they've lost confidence in you

[Zanza]

Read some opinion pieces and Truss seems worse than Johnson. Beholden to the right-wing nationalist wing of the Tories, an instinctive libertarian, none of Johnsons charisma...

Supposedly, she considers arch-Brexiteers like IDS, Redwood, JRM, Frost as cabinet members and wants to break the NIP as one of her first actions in office. 

Is there anything where she might actually be an improvement over Johnson?

[Tamas]

Is there anything where she might actually be an improvement over Johnson?

Hard to see how. The only "improvement" I can imagine is that she won't be as completely lazy as Johnson is. But with her she is bound to do more damage than good, so I kinda' wish she would leave us adrift like Johnson did, instead of continuing with the Thatcher cosplay. Carbon-copying radical policies to turn the late 70s around is not what we need right now.

[Zanza]

Maybe, but during her stint in the trade ministry, she seems to have gone mainly for photo ops instead of the tough negotiations to achieve something worthwhile for Britain. Is there something to indicate she is less shallow than Johnson?

[Richard Hakluyt]

She appears to be a vacuous, stupid and conceited fool 

[Josquius]

Read some opinion pieces and Truss seems worse than Johnson. Beholden to the right-wing nationalist wing of the Tories, an instinctive libertarian, none of Johnsons charisma...

Supposedly, she considers arch-Brexiteers like IDS, Redwood, JRM, Frost as cabinet members and wants to break the NIP as one of her first actions in office.

Is there anything where she might actually be an improvement over Johnson?

Trashing the tories reputation and accelerationism.

[Sheilbh]

Is there anything where she might actually be an improvement over Johnson?

Well I think she'd be better at doing the job. Johnson's level is Mayor of London where he delegated vast amounts of the job to pretty competent people. Under Livingstone there was one Deputy Mayor, I think Johnson had about six and basically turned it into a mini-cabinet (which Khan has also kept). Johnson just did the bit of the job that was banging the drum for London, opening things etc. He was not on the detail and wasn't very involved in actual governance. That was fine for that job because the mayor doesn't have much power and doesn't really have to make calls that much. But he's been dreadful at any job that requires him to be across detail and where he can't just delegate everything.

From what I've read Truss is a relatively competent minister who does that bit of the job that Johnson really isn't into. She's a bit of an enthusiast and gets over-excited about specific issues/sometimes fringe-ish ideas that take a while to talk her out of, but she is interested in policy and detail and does the work of being a minister in a way that I don't think Johnson ever did. Now that's a fairly neutral thing - being better at doing things in government rather depends on what you're doing. Johnson's basically a big spending, liberal Tory. Truss isn't - she is, as you say, far more on the libertarian side.

Interesting counter to the Corbynite take on Trussonomics, from Torsten Bell of the Resolution Foundation - basically what her advisors are saying is utterly orthodox, but what she's said is a bit more interesting (and I agree with her on the bits where she's unorthodox - I'd like Labour to embrace those a bit):

Torsten Bell
@TorstenBell
1h
This Trussonomics piece uses the word radical/change a lot but actually massively underplays what is genuinely different/interesting about Liz Truss on the economy
It's got three blokes mansplaining trussonomics and defining it as macroeconomic radicalism - but when pushed the actual policy is the status quo. They think @bankofengland should raise rates (they are) and the big idea on fiscal policy is "debt should fall" = current fiscal rule
So what that leaves you with is can you deliver the smaller state/higher growth necessary to make those tax cuts long term sustainable within their own (basically orthodox despite the MMT like language) framework. There's no word on what might get spending down or growth up
Which is a shame because you'd learn more from reading what Liz Truss has actually said on the economy, much of which is genuinely different to the current political consensus. I'd highlight two things
1. She's genuinely more pro dynamism/mobility for firms and people that Boris Johnson or anyone in the Labour Party would be. She doesnt think people staying where they were born is the top priority and says it's a problem workers don't change jobs/place often enough
2. She doesnt share the nostalgia on what our economy should look like that dominates our political class. She knows we're a service economy, is happy to sell out farmers as price of trade deals, and doesnt promise a future of a manufacturing revival
Anyway just some reflections. We're going to be borrowing loads more - this is mainly due to energy price surges but yes also Liz Truss being more relaxed about it in the short term. But the underlying macro-economics is the status quo, so if you just focus on that you miss a lot

Hard to see how. The only "improvement" I can imagine is that she won't be as completely lazy as Johnson is. But with her she is bound to do more damage than good, so I kinda' wish she would leave us adrift like Johnson did, instead of continuing with the Thatcher cosplay. Carbon-copying radical policies to turn the late 70s around is not what we need right now.

I thought you were a big fan of hiking interest rates to tackle inflation?

Maybe, but during her stint in the trade ministry, she seems to have gone mainly for photo ops instead of the tough negotiations to achieve something worthwhile for Britain. Is there something to indicate she is less shallow than Johnson?

Ish.

I remember lots of conversation by, for want of a better word, Remainers that it wouldn't be as easy as just rolling over the existing EU deals or making a few cosmetic changes to them - actually it would be a lot of opportunity for other countries to try to improve their terms and could be challenging. She broadly did manage to roll them over which was not a given and was described as a risk by trade experts - so that deserves some credit. She politically was very good at using that for photo ops and building her brand in the party as the face of the upside of Brexit.

I also think the UK has (and has always had) a slightly different take on trade than a lot of Europe - or at least through the EU. So you see it with the stuff about how even New Zealand news channels don't understand the UK agreeing to a deal that helps their farmers. Not many people care about farmers - the benefit is cheaper food. And I think that goes for most domestic producers - generally people don't care and, for better or worse, I think would choose cheaper goods over helping British farming/industry etc. There's a limit to that but I think, especially now, if you can position something as cheaper imports that would have support. So, to take the New Zealand example, it's a bad deal if your priority is protecting British lamb farmers because eliminates quotas within a couple of years - if your priority is cheap lamb, it's pretty good.

So I think what she did was not necessarily just as simple as photo-ops (though she definitely did them too) and I think if you're judging her deals from an EU standard they were bad, but I wonder if that's the right approach when I think the UK may go down a different trade strategy than the EU.

[Tamas]

The eternal optimism of Sheilbh is exhausting.