2024 Election thread

I've pretty much lost the thread of what you were arguing now, TBH.

It started off with low turnout helping Labour. Then you said we need to look at voter switching for which data is only available between 2019 and 2024 as far as I can tell - one election. And now we're seemingly agreeing that lots of other factors obscure the purported advantage to Labour. This seems to boil down to "when everything is going your way..."

I think you could argue that there is a long term downward trend in voter turnout. I think you could also argue that there is some inverse correlation between the number of Labour MPs and voter turn out over the last 35 years, but not before.

The key question is whether anyone knows how to paste GIFs into here using an android phone?

Feels a bit like joining three points on a curve and claiming it is almost a straight line.

Surely a more obvious way to gauge national views would be the regular Social Attitudes surveys.

The second one, not contesting as such, just commenting that a correlation over 3 changes of government -'97, '10 and '24 - in 35 years is quite a small data set.

Only if fewer people turn up to vote for them.

That's fair enough. I did say "some" inverse correlation, but it is a limited dataset. I was trying to help Rick articulate his point.

Maybe I have a future at the FT.

I mean you joke but the odds are that large parts of the Pennines and Peak district etc will now be subject to multiple overlapping applications, each of which will be submitted multiple times for the next decade or so. You know I sympathise with visitors and residents, on account of we've got a vast coastline, much of which is adjacent a very shallow sea that would make a perfect spot for a few wind farms without ruining anyone's home.

From what I've read, several are proposed within 50km of that seizmic testing array in Cumbria, where they cannot be built without the UK breaching it's duties under the international nuclear non proliferation treaty.

Doesn't stop several new applications coming in each year. The Scottish government even approves some of them and sticks them in a queue for when technology enables them to be built. Presumably they are hoping to uninvent nuclear bombs.

No one lives there except those who do. Not many of them, but those that are affected are often profoundly affected.

Anyhoo, that aside the company in question appears to be sensible. It's possible an issue in Scotland is the shockingly unfair land ownership, meaning many private rural dwellings are completely within vast estates owned by people who don't live there and who will earn millions from such developments.

Generously pay off those who are profoundly affected. The figures will be piddling compared with the long term costs of doing nothing.

An organisation I worked with some while back was grinding to a halt with organisational paralysis, a shrinking number of volunteers, and those left feeling frustrated. One of my partners in crime runs a big business, so is no stranger to running an efficient meeting, and after one of our meetings he told me how many times the word "can't" was used by the chair. It was a good way to illustrate why we were paralysed and demotivated.

It's now turned round with a new chair, and the new direction is "How can we do xxx?" The Tory regime had just said "can't" to wind turbines, and that's not an option.

The threshold for being badly affected doesn't reach not being able to sleep with the windows open or needing to close the curtains during the day. And I have never heard of a compulsory purchase order or indeed any form of compensation even for people living a few hundred metres away from even the largest 150+ ones.

The community kick backs usually amount to tiny grant schemes. I'm aware OVO have more thoughtful suggestions, but they will have to somehow severely limit the number of people offered cheap electricity to make it viable.

Anyway, I followed how many people opposed them in southern Scotland - albeit it's the most densely turbined part of the planet - and the population density is a fraction of anywhere in England.

But I'd be surprised if they developed an ANOB or National Park so I'm fine.

Sure, identifying why it's problematic is part of the solution, but once it's decided "This is going to happen", then the conversation needs to move onto 'how'. OK, I'm not going to say I'd love to have added noise from a new construction near my house, though hundreds of hundreds of thousands (maybe millions) of people can hear motorways with their windows open. That didn't stop them building motorways, such as the M32, but people still live there.

Thing is, the road noise drops at night. Whereas, for a turbine, the gearing drops but the carry on turning wherever possible.

Fwiw I also sympathise with people affected by roads. There are studies to show it is detrimental to child development, adult blood pressure and so on, just because of low level noise stress. I read that article (you?) posted about the westway and it was pretty shocking.

I'm highly noise sensitive, I know that. Like Spike Milligan level sensitivity. It's a curse, being a light sleeper.

But someone always loses out with development, and it can be completely devastating for them. They are hidden amongst the actual nimbys who just like walking their dog somewhere in particular, but completely dismissed and ignored - even insulted - as a consequence. Particularly where there is green washing. You know, if you are against your home being profoundly and irrevocably changed for the worse, you are against the planet, that sort of thing.

Sure. But there are viable alternatives to industrialising the fragments of wild land we have left in the UK. The particular issue with turbines is they move, are white and are quite loud in quite quiet places.

We have a superb offshore capability. That's our national USP. Slightly more expensive, but longer term where we should be getting energy is at sea. From the air, the tides, possibly waves. We are a very, very crowded island, so let's use the sea.

It's also a bit short sighted. Bad renewables creates opposition to good renewables and holds the whole sector back, in my view.

And there is a lot of bad.

Of particular concern is the threshold for bypassing local planning. It means flagrantly inappropriately scaled developments will be proposed to meet that threshold and game the system.

Take this for example - it breaches every bit of guidance.imaginable, from rare bird flight paths, co2 release from peat, extremely high visual impact from all of Midlothian, most of Edinburghs regional park, most of its hills and Fife

Extremely close proximity to about a dozen houses,.l cumulative impact from other developments. It is low altitude and even in a wind shadow.

Shouldn't make it past a preliminary scoping opinion, but is now in the hands of one bloke to decide because they made the numbers big enough.

https://www.energyconsents.scot/ApplicationDetails.aspx?cr=ECU00004661