adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Sept 3, 2023 12:54:48 GMT
I'm going with my partner to the Netherlands in 3 weeks. we have hit a problem Many places don't take credit cards ( not even American Express )then we hit a problem with debit cards Visa is not accepted in most places nor is mastercard Maestro is preferred I and yes I know Mastercard own Maestro any ideas who does a prepay maestro card I usually find that's the _last_ card that would be accepted. As for NL, I've been there a few times over the years and never had a problem with Visa. Maybe I went to the wrong places.... Well, likewise on both levels. (Clearly, the *right* places...)
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Sept 3, 2023 8:26:31 GMT
Some years ago my stepson was talking to one of his friends who was unemployed, and mentioned they had a vacancy. His friend did some maths and said he couldn't take the job as he's be working for less than £1 per hour. The taper for people coming off JSA/UB for only a few hours of work is a separate issue entirely.
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Sept 2, 2023 17:07:55 GMT
May be you choose your lifestyle staying away from them. I thought the daughter and the delivery man was the real story. How does a 11 yo girl order a pizza without her mother knowing. Does she have her own credit card? Knows the PIN for her mum's phone, which has the app on it...?
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Sept 2, 2023 16:32:53 GMT
Umm, easily, if they want to get off their arses and work for money. Same as other seasonal jobs - tourism, Xmas packing, etc. No. A job is normally a part of one's life. 40 hours or so per week and that's it. I'll let you suggest that to the farmer. I don't think I ascribed any kind of characteristic to any nationality. But I'm sure you'd agree with me that people willing to move to the other side of the continent or world to better their lot are far less lazy than those who don't want to get a job a few miles down the road.
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Sept 2, 2023 6:27:04 GMT
Having some knowledge of Boston ( Lincs ) the place that voted most heavily for Brexit. the people there have funny ideas, they claim that the "foreigners" are taking there jobs, however talking recently to someone who employs staff there they can't get locals to apply for jobs for love nor money. This has led to employers asking for permission to bring workers in, whilst those same people sit and claim benefits. Most of those jobs are a way of life. Usually a "way of life" jobs are interesting or nobody would do them. Here though the vast majority of the workforce live on site in the farm in small huts shared with many other workers. The idea is that during that time you work as hard as you can and then leave at the end of the season to go home to enjoy the fruits of your labour. How can a local compete with that work ethic ? Umm, easily, if they want to get off their arses and work for money. Same as other seasonal jobs - tourism, Xmas packing, etc. There's a farm not far from here that brings in seasonal pickers. They used to be Eastern European. Now, they're Nepali. There's plenty of farms round here that have also tried over the last few years to employ British staff as seasonal pickers... www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/brexit-eu-agriculture-farms-fruit-picking-migrant-workers-labour-shortage-a8469806.htmlwww.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hereford-worcester-65607843But it won't be long before they aren't needed, automated out of jobs, as so many have been before them. www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/brexit-latest-fruit-pickers-robot-eu-migrant-workers-essex-university-eastern-europe-a8511321.html
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Sept 2, 2023 6:22:54 GMT
Yes that is the stricter definition but the reality is people voted for a Johnson government even though technically it was the MPs that chose him and the people voted for their MPs. Nobody voted for Rishi as PM indirectly or otherwise. The public did not vote for Johnson to become PM (although he did go on to lead his party into an election victory) The public did not vote Truss to become PM. The public did not vote May to become PM. (although she did go on to lead her party into an election victory) The public did not vote Brown to become PM. The public did not vote Major to become PM. (although he did go on to lead his party into an election victory) The public did not vote Callaghan to become PM. OTOH, the public did "vote for" Wilson, Thatcher, Blair, Cameron to become PMs - indirectly. ...and that's just the last half century and ten PMs. Six changes of PM through internal party mechanisms, four through elections. It's about time we got used to that basic reality. Our system is very simple. We vote for a named individual as our MP. That named individual is usually a member of a political party. The party with most MPs forms a government. The PM is the parliamentary leader of that party. ANY of those can change without a public vote, except for the named individual. We do not have a directly elected PM in the way we have some directly elected mayors, or the French or Americans have a directly elected president.
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Sept 2, 2023 6:15:05 GMT
"De Moor was complaining that the influx of asylum-seekers over the past two years in the nation of 11.5 million had filled the shelter centers to near capacity of 33,500. Last year, Belgium had nearly 37,000 applications for protection, the federal agency Fedasil said. ... Still, said de Moor, “our country has already done more than its share for a long time,” and called on some other EU nations to increase their effort instead."BE : 37,000 applications for 11.5m population = 1 per 310 pop'n. UK : 74,750 applications for 67.6m population = 1 per 905 pop'n. yes but Net migration was 600,000 with 1.2 million coming in and 600,000 leaving You do know that the others all have visas issued by the UK government...?
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Sept 1, 2023 16:00:04 GMT
"De Moor was complaining that the influx of asylum-seekers over the past two years in the nation of 11.5 million had filled the shelter centers to near capacity of 33,500. Last year, Belgium had nearly 37,000 applications for protection, the federal agency Fedasil said. ... Still, said de Moor, “our country has already done more than its share for a long time,” and called on some other EU nations to increase their effort instead."BE : 37,000 applications for 11.5m population = 1 per 310 pop'n. UK : 74,750 applications for 67.6m population = 1 per 905 pop'n.
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Aug 31, 2023 12:40:38 GMT
In the case of Nats perhaps back up servers or something? They had backup servers. In the case of a hardware failure, the backup servers would have done the job just fine. Trouble is, the backups were running the same software - so when the software couldn't cope with a rogue input, and shut down... guess what the backups did?
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Aug 31, 2023 8:38:55 GMT
But so frustrating to have his incredibly efficient operation screwed up by the incompetence of others... Indeed. Ryanair keep costs low by their efficiency, That very "efficiency" (= short turn-round, high utilisation) is what exacerbates the knock-on effects from problems, though, since it means that there's more flights disrupted by planes and crews not being where they should be, and less opportunity to put things right. When UK airspace is closed, to all intents and purposes, for most of one of the busiest flying days of the year - how do you suggest a business plan avoids it, except by simply cancelling flights to/through UK airspace?
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Aug 30, 2023 19:36:54 GMT
Should be short. "It's all raging codswallop"
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Aug 30, 2023 15:37:09 GMT
NATS claimed the glitch has been fixed and won't happen again. Well, that's a VERY quick bugfix. I'm sure it's been VERY thoroughly tested, and ABSOLUTELY won't have the slightest scope for introducing any other issues... <gibber>
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Aug 30, 2023 11:24:33 GMT
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Aug 30, 2023 10:15:40 GMT
the "quotes" this morning from Nats are 'interesting'. They seem to be saying that when presented with the erroneous flight plan data the system went into 'fail safe' shutdown (or similar). Especially when the backup system then does exactly the same thing presented with the same data... xkcd.com/327/
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adrianc
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Post by adrianc on Aug 30, 2023 7:41:44 GMT
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