SimonBlog

What do passport e-gates actually check? And, in particular, are they really sufficient to prevent immigration abuses from us who live in western countries? Ben, of BenBlog fame, thinks they are enough. With respect, if the aim is secure immigration then they are not. But then GWR-style e-tickets are also a step back from security so I guess Ben  wins?

Some may remember R v Middlemiss , a Canadian military case where Master Seaman Middlemiss was fined and reprimanded for refusing to pay for and attend a mess dinner. I get that mess dinners are part of the military tradition (in Canada, the UK, the USA and no doubt elsewhere). But a direct order to pay for “compulsory fun” sits uneasily with me. An order to attend a unit team-building event is one thing, an order to spend money is another. One might argue that mess dues and extra messing charges are such an obligation also; one might equally argue that it is perhaps justified to subject officers to different obligations than other ranks. I also appreciate that in US basic training they do order you to pay for haircuts and for some items of non-issue kit, which also sits uneasily with me. I think the British military technically allows you to bring the relevant items but discourages it. I still don’t think “tradition” justifies military orders to spend money, other than to reimburse fo...

Network Rail published a strategy essentially stating that most of the Great Britain railway network should be electrified with 25 kV overhead wires, and hydrogen and batteries should be reserved for special cases. (In the case of hydrogen this is good, as making the hydrogen uses a large amount of energy. There is no need for railways to use hydrogen ever , or even batteries except in depots or maybe  for very short branch lines.) https://www.networkrail.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Traction-Decarbonisation-Network-Strategy-Interim-Programme-Business-Case.pdf So why do the UK government hate the idea of such investment? Indeed, they seem a LOT more keen to have OLE on roads than on railways! A similar argument can be made re opposition to HS2. My issue is that it is insufficiently ambitious, even as proposed never mind with the misguided government cuts. I would make one change. The western leg of HS2, including Birmingham to Toton, should be built in full , and should be exte...

Publishers in the UK (and this includes otherwise "self-published" books published via Amazon, Lulu or similar services) are legally required to supply to the British Library a copy of the "best edition" within a month of publication. They are also required to supply a copy to each of five other libraries (the Bodleian Library, the Cambridge University Library, the National Library of Scotland, the National Library of Wales and Trinity College Dublin Library) but these only on request  (within a year of publication). However, there is a lacuna in that there is no real sanction. The only sanction, under section 3 of the Legal Deposit Libraries Act 2003, is that the library can demand a copy, in default of which it can sue for the costs of getting a copy by alternate means. https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2003/28/section/3 This is a sufficient sanction for the libraries other than the British Library which have to request copies. It is not sufficient for the Brit...

It is well known that, on ending UK school year 11 (15-16), players in UK football academies (run by professional teams) face the biggest selection of their life - whether the academy will keep them post-16. And most academies are run so that most do not make it. There is ostensibly one saving grace - the "exit trials" (officially "assessment trials).  https://www.lfe.org.uk/assessment-trials/ Unfortunately, the thing that makes me angry  is the dates - in 2022, 24, 25 and 26 of May. This is precisely in the period when these 15-16 year olds should be preparing for (or taking) their GCSEs in case they need to face a career without football.  At least at that stage they should be able to get into a sixth form college to do A-levels for an alternate career. If rejected two years later, as does happen often (as football clubs love to whittle down), they might have few options (at 16-18 they have to provide some sort of alternative qualification, but AFAICT it tends to be so...

A possibly interesting video on non-radioactive steel? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XsVuFBp0BQ Though is there really that much need other than for warships, submarines and a few sensitive scientific facilities/experiments? It does remind me of how radiocarbon dating was massively affected by the nuclear bombs and tests from 1945 onwards. Bomb pulse

OK how is this acceptable to anyone? Shippers or even freight rail companies? 22 hours to go the last six miles is surely a massive inconvenience to the railroad, never mind to the shipper. https://twitter.com/Jeff_CCTuba/status/1519374652203802625 What happened to "there's no benefits to be had by late running trains"? At the very least don't "park" trains on the main line (and absolutely never on level crossings please!) - this just causes massive inconvenience to everyone involved. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jnmC5IOYg0

I have heard a lot about about the Disney Starcruiser, a lot negative. https://www.disneyworld.co.uk/destinations/star-wars-galactic-starcruiser/ I really think that it would be a much better experience if: it were half the price if it were three or four nights, not two it was much less intensive activities (such as sabacc) ran for most of the day, not just for narrow windows Basically, it seems just too regimented and compressed an experience to be something I'd be willing to partake in.

OK the case of Lister v Romford Ice and Cold Storage makes me angry. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lister_v_Romford_Ice_and_Cold_Storage_Co_Ltd It makes employees liable to employers for carelessness. Many would expect the employer to take that risk, and particularly in cases such as this (a vehicle accident) the employer's insurer .  This is important - when driving for work, you are uninsured . Your employer is insured. Their insurer can (and has, as in the Lister case) come back at you. While in other situations employers have something called "vicarious liability", meaning normally the employer has deeper pockets and would be the one sued, and outside actual malice few employers would sue their staff (in the Lister case the employer was theoretically suing but in reality it was their insurer), always bear in mind the risk of say a liquidator, administrator, bankruptcy trustee or official receiver putting the risk on you when they cancel the insurance. This has also ha...

Ok, with respect, WTF? It is common for civil servants, particularly in operational roles not needing regular physical presence, to work from home part or even all the time. So why the insistence on going back to the office when this is not necessary to get the work done? https://twitter.com/dinosofos/status/1517561184072962048?s=21&t=xCtYdsRLcrZnCO1v3y7cww