vivweb01blog

This blog will be updated regularly in the run up to the Autumn Statement at the end of October.  I'm planning to ask a series of key questions on 'X' (Twitter in old money), then attempt to answer them myself  in this blog,  in more detail than X will allow.  Why ? It's important that we all keep this Government's 'feet to the fire' to reduce the risk of losing any more of our precious and hard-won benefits.....  See also my recent blogs for more details on this topic: https://vivweb01.blogspot.com/2024/07/labours-war-against-pensioners-where.html https://vivweb01.blogspot.com/2024/09/update-on-pensioner-benefit-changes.html Here's the first offering for the pot: 1)   DWP have identified 880,000 pensioners who they 'believe are entitled to Pension Credit'.  Why don’t they do the decent thing and simply award these folks the benefit, without forcing them to fill out a 230-question form ? Comments: The answer is almost certainly money....and to an...

  Amidst all the current government-inspired gloom we’re currently experiencing, a ray of hope shone out in the retail sector in late September with the news that the last of the Issa brothers had quit his executive role at ASDA. Before we roll out the bunting, however, we should remember that the ‘terrible twins’ as they became known after their takeover in 2021, both retain significant involvement and influence in the business as non-executive directors, and one of them remains a part-owner. This is because the EG group, in which they both still have a major financial interest, continues to own ASDA. Zuber Issa sold his stake in ASDA in June ’24 but remains a non-exec. director of EG. Mohsin Issa stepped down as CEO of ASDA in September, and is now sole CEO of EG group. Stuart Rose has now assumed his responsibilities as ASDA’s CEO. As I predicted in a previous blog , from a financial point of view, the Issas’ intervention in ASDA’s fortunes has been little short of disastrou...

I first published the text of this post on my website. As  a consumer interested in installing solar panels in UK,  I wanted to see what detailed advice was available on how to go about it, but didn't really find anything suitable. I decided to share my experience, as far as it went, in the hope that it would make life a bit easier for anyone else in the same boat.   There is plenty of advice out there on the web, but it seems to be mostly from installers, who will naturally want to extol the benefits of their product, and won't necessarily want to highlight the pitfalls. I've tried to do just that by taking the reader through what is likely to happen if you embark on a quest for solar panels yourself.  I hope it's useful in helping you answer the question in the title...... --------------------------------   Solar Panels: Are They Right For Me ? Despite the relatively slow uptake of domestic micro-generation technology over the past decade, m any of us are...