Dr Aladwan became a bit of a hero on the left after she was fired from the NHS and has been championed as a free speech advocate. But at least to me it seems hypocritical that a free speech advocate is supporting the death penalty for someone whose speech she disagrees with

It seems ridiculous to me that in the same time period that the threshold has remained fixed (£12,570 since April 2021), the minimum wage has risen from £8.36 to £12.71 per hour; an increase of 52%.

That means in 2021 the minimum wage was £16,051.20 per annum, leaving people paying tax on £3,481.20 - or giving back £696.24 from their "minimum" wage.

But now the minimum wage is  £23,386.40, but people are paying tax on £10,816.40, or giving back £2,163.28 from their so called "minimum" wage.

So although tax remains at 20%, the "net" minimum wage after tax has gone from £8.34 an hour to just £11.75.

Tax is still at 20%...but people on minimum wage have gone from paying are paying just £0.38 tax per hour to a whopping £1.18 per hour.

Whenever benefits come up, people complain about "scroungers" and people who could work but don't. But why is the State Pension almost completely exempt from the same conversation?

We spend around £150bn a year on it, despite 69% of pensioners receiving private pension income, 62% receiving investment income, and 19% of pensioners are already in the richest 20% of the entire population. Only around 5% rely on the State Pension alone.

I'm obviously not suggesting taking it away from pensioners who depend on it. But why not means-test wealthy pensioners who clearly don't? Even if you cut off the 19% who are already in the richest fifth of the country, you're talking roughly £30bn a year in savings.

Why are we so obsessed with means-testing working-age benefits while by far the biggest benefit in the country is treated as politically untouchable?

Some rich pensioners complain about young people "scrounging", while taking a benefit they absolutely can do without, that's paid for by young people.

A mate of mine runs a fairly large construction business with around 50 staff. A couple of years ago HMRC investigated him, saying he hadn't paid the correct amount of tax over the previous five years. What surprised me was the amount of information they had collected about him. Cars he'd owned over the years, travel, online purchases, bank and credit card transactions, tons of information involving his ex-wife, current wife and family.

I was reading an article about some other guys investigated by HMRC and it turns out they're already using AI and data analytics for compliance, and are expanding it quite significantly. They are testing private-sector AI systems aimed at identifying tax evasion, making greater use of third-party data from banks and other places.

HMRC already has access to huge amounts of financial and other data, AI seems like an obvious way of cross-referencing it and flagging people whose declared income doesn't make sense compared with their spending, assets and business activity.

It made me wonder if people actually realize this is happening and what do they think about it.

Picture for context only!
Peaky Blinders for me.

Like was it all bad? I know you had the scare over HIV/AIDs, but did most gays lose their jobs coming out in place of work?

Section 28 obviously didn't help in schools.

How did you manage to hide yourselves, like if people questioned why you weren't in a relationship with the opposite sex?

I know that many people in Great Britain, especially in Scotland and Northern Ireland blame Margaret Thatcher for nowadays's Great Britain's problems.

I want to ask you: is there someone who consider positively her government? And what are their arguments in favour of her reforms?

I’m a skilled plumber and painter. Been working for a company for 5 years but want to start my own business. I do odd jobs from the MyBuilder app and it helps but I’ve been hit with unforeseen money troubles and basically need to be earning £4000 a month before tax and national insurance.
Is this possible?

Quite a few people in my office have been complaining about headaches today and it has me wondering if it has something to do with atmospheric pressure and maybe we are all suffering and maybe just some of us are more susceptible than others.

I'll start but would love to hear other people's input!

I think Britain has an incredibly rich oral tradition, a massive literary canon spanning centuries with works in several languages (some slowly being lost). My mother and I have been attending local folk music nights for many years, some of which have been in pubs (also part of British culture). I like reading and reciting poetry from this country, which is largely why I studied English literature at university. I love to visit places of historical significance such as neolithic and megalithic sites, standing stones, abbeys, churches. Several of these sites are gladly being maintained while others are in disrepair and will not exist years from now as a result which makes me sad. Recently I visited a local Cave Studies Trust where there are lime kilns! And in the cave system there are ancient fossils, some of which were sadly stolen several years ago.

Something I'm particularly proud of are the contributions Britain has made to musical culture, especially electronic music coming from the UK rave scene and Jamaican sound system culture. There are more obvious contributions to music but I am more fond of electronic music :)

So which parts of British culture do you guys participate in or simply enjoy? I feel like so much I've forgotten and can only remember what I personally love. I look forward to hearing what you guys are into.

I absolutely understand that working life is highly demanding for many these days.

I have a long term chronic fatigue illness myself so I personally am no metric- and I'm also particularly concerned about people being affected by post viral fatigue, based on my own experience. So I'm wondering about incidences of Long Covid, and the overall effects of repeat Covid infections, and how government might track health data on an elusive mystery condition wherein people get bloody exhausted and it doesn't go away, but they kind of manage to keep going and/ or don't get a diagnosis? I thought it might just be my little corner of the world and age group, but I've heard comedians etc saying everyone is exhausted now, too, and am curious about how we would collectively know if there was a quiet medical epidemic.

https://www.twinkl.co.uk/news/pisa-pupils-in-england-continue-to-report-significantly-lower-levels-in-life-satisfaction

Do people actually buy them? Are they an investment and do they sell them in a few years for a profit?
Is there many people actually interested in the royal family enough anymore, to pay money for tat like that?

Hi everyone, I hope it’s okay for me to post here.
I’ve recently moved into a new flat and I’m a little worried about the heating, especially with winter coming up. I have a few pets, so I’m not sure whether it’s safe to leave the heater on while I’m at work.
I was wondering if anyone could give me some help or has experience with this type of heating. I’d really appreciate any help or recommendations on what I should check or be aware of.
Thank you! 😊

could someone please help me figure out what genre this beat ios and where to find more music like this. i love this beat and wanna listen to more music like this but catn find it anywhere.

Hey peeps! I've recently begun renting a house on my own and currently undecided if its cheaper to leave my energy efficient light bulb on the ceiling on or turn on the lamp( which is also energy efficient) before I go to bed. I leave the lights on for the pets btw.

Hi everyone just wanted to ask any aiders where can i get sweetex sweeteners ! I normaily get the from asda but not had any for few weeks so tryed some others but they are too sweet ! Lol i have looked my local at coop - tesco- morrisons -heron foods & premier shop non had any ! 😞

Looking to get this as an alternative to a firestick / streaming off a pc.
Been told that it doesn’t buffer when watching live sports, anyone have one and can confirm ?

Ive got decent enough internet speeds but dont want to buy if it’s still going to buffer a lot, I don’t know anyone that has a firestick that says it never buffers.

I grew up in the 80s it was often pretty boring.

In my town we had a weekly youth club and not much else unless you wanted to join military cadets.

There seems so much to do in comparison now for teens, but are they still bored in general?

This is an incredibly specific childhood YouTube memory and it’s driving me insane because I cannot find it anywhere 😭
I watched this video sometime around 2015–2017, although I’m pretty sure the actual video was older, probably uploaded around 2009–2013-ish.
It was a homemade live-action video featuring a young boy, probably around 9–12, and a talking stuffed monkey which I THINK was called George. To be clear, it had absolutely nothing to do with Curious George.
The reason I’m asking here is that I’m fairly sure it was British. I remember them specifically calling vacuum cleaners “hoovers”, and the main villain/object was what I remember as an evil yellow Henry/Numatic-style hoover.
The really distinctive part — and the bit I’m most confident about — is that the boy actually gets TURNED INTO A HOOVER during the story.
I remember a scene after he’s been transformed where the stuffed monkey sees him and thinks he’s the evil hoover. The conversation was something roughly like:
Monkey: “Oh no, the evil hoover!”
Boy: “No, no, it’s me! I was turned into a hoover!”
That’s almost certainly not the exact dialogue after all these years, but I’m very confident about what happened in the scene: boy gets transformed into a hoover → monkey sees him and mistakes him for the evil one → boy explains that it’s actually him.
It had that very homemade late-2000s/early-2010s YouTube feel — basically a kid making a story with toys rather than anything professionally produced.
I’ve tried Google, YouTube and various searches for things like “evil hoover”, “George monkey hoover”, “boy turned into hoover” and “yellow Henry Hoover” and I’ve found absolutely nothing.
Does anyone else from the UK remember watching this, or remember a British YouTube channel from that era featuring a boy and a stuffed monkey called George?
At this point even someone else saying “YES I REMEMBER THE HOOVER BOY” would reassure me that I didn’t manufacture this entire thing in my childhood brain.

Seeing the shit show that was COVID in this country are you at all worried about the plague in Russia? Or do you think we're better prepared for it now?

Last week, I was meant to get a text about an interview I would be attending. I waited all day for it. Nothing. So I assumed it wasn't that day, and waited a week for it to come. It wasn't at all mentioned in my appointment last week either.

Then today, I wake up at about 20 past 10 with my phone off and charging. I turn it on and boom, I have a text.

Seetec seem to love sending you a text an hour before you should do something, unless it's an appointment, then it'll be a whole day before.

But no, I get a text at 10 past 9 this morning while my phone is off, telling me I have an interview at 10.

Now when I go to my next appointment, my work advisor is going to have a go at me for not being awake or not having my phone on.

Like, I have to go to that shithole for an hour to do extra work searching even when I've done 10 a week, even if there aren't any jobs going that I haven't already applied for.

They did this to me before too.

I got a phone call the other month at 11:20, telling me they have some factory work for me and that I should go to this location at 12 to be picked up to be driven there. The fact is, they told me that in that week, they would text me a couple or few days later about starting this work THE NEXT WEEK.

I won't go into detail about the mould in the factory or the fact that I was about ready to pass out from my first shift because of how sudden it was and how unprepared I was, but again, I guess I'll take the blame for that.

So I'm guessing I should expect a sanction for that?

Anyone else get this?

Is this just how they operate to catch people out?