vivweb01blog

Editor's note: I can now confirm from personal experience that the situation with respect to availability of 'routine' appointments is truly dire.  I attempted to book one at our local GP practice over the counter yesterday and was told '...sorry, there are no available appointments on my system'. An attempt today to book an appointment online via the SystmOnline software our practice uses for bookings showed no appointments available in the period where booking was available, ending mid-September (i.e. at least an 8-week wait, with no guarantee of anything would be forthcoming after that.) This is clearly unacceptable and confirms that a policy of 'Rationing by Availability' by the NHS is firmly in force. On the basis of recent media reports, I suspect this is country-wide and not just an isolated case. The government has emphasised the need to keep the population healthy to help the NHS, and we are regularly encouraged not to delay if we detect anything ...

  Two years ago I published a blog describing in detail some of the problems with our UK political system, as I saw it then.   Last year's General Election result ‘set the seal’ on the unsuitability of our ‘First Past the Post’ (FPP) system, and reinforced the need for change. This will need to be radical if we are to maintain  our democracy in a healthy state, and ensure it continues to be fit for purpose in the 21 st Century. A reappraisal is particularly important at a time when populism is eroding modern democratic institutions and the world as a whole is tending towards autocracies as the chosen method of government.   Amongst other things, to achieve this we will need to exert more control on the UK government of the day, and this will involve some form of continuous assessment ‘with teeth’. We cannot afford to continue to allow governments we elect with large working majorities 'carte blanche' to do whatever they want for the whole of their now mandator...

This blog was originally published in October 2022. Given the efforts still being made to produce a secure and optimised solution to the NI Protocol and the EU border, I've updated it to reflect changes since 2022, in the hope that it may contribute to a practical solution for import compliance monitoring. ****** I’ve often wondered why Brussels are so concerned about goods intended for use in Northern Ireland straying into the Irish Republic.... After all, UK was a member of the EU until very recently, and the standards we apply to our goods within UK are still closely comparable with those applied in EU. For the most part, this is likely to remain so, despite our national obsession since Brexit with 'going it alone'. Tariffs for UK goods imported to EU are effectively 'zero-rated' under the current withdrawal agreement, so there is little financial incentive to 'smuggle' goods into Eire from NI. The proportion of goods flowing into NI from UK that is des...

Editor's note: For post-budget 2024 updates and their implications, see end of text.  Additional taxes are now definitely on the cards for October 2025, given Starmer's back-bench induced U-turns on Winter Fuel and Disability benefit cuts. Reeves will want to avoid breaking manifesto promises by raising employee NI, VAT or income tax.  What else is there that hasn't yet been targeted ? - yes, you guessed it  - personal IHT rates and tax thresholds. Farmers have already lost their IHT relief with a 20% IHT imposition, so the rest of us are now in the firing line for increases and/or relief removals. The spouse-to-spouse transfer exemption would be a 'juicy morsel' for the exchequer, and they might even be tempted to risk it, now that  marriage is a lot less popular than it was....watch out folks - your widow/widower's financial future could be at risk when you pass on! (mind you, quite a few of the Labour back-benchers are married and some are even 'getting...

  The world of online e-reading has become a confusing place over recent years, with a 'battle royal' raging between the publishing industry and internet users as more and more content goes online.  The industry are desperately trying to preserve their income streams in the face of increased online access to e-publications of all sorts which are outside their control, but the 'shadow' libraries are continually finding ways to outwit them..... It would seem obvious that a new publishing model is long overdue, with some alternative arrangement for internet access when a book is first published, and a better deal for struggling authors on whom we all depend for our fiction. Until the publishers accept this, and act accordingly, they will continue to lose ground; their business model will continue to struggle, and could eventually fail altogether. In an attempt to unravel some of the complexity of accessing reading material online while this battle continues, here is ...