UK Universal Credit Payments - December 2018

The UK government changed the system so that recipients of social benefits would get their benefits consolidated into theri Universal Credit payments.  Unfortunately, many of these people are not able to apply economic judgement to their spending and often spent these benefits on 'unnecessary' items rather than clothing, food, housing as intended.

EU break up

Yesterday, I posted a blog saying that I thought one of the unintended consequences of the UK EU referendum was the breakup of the EU.

Today, I find the following piece wrt to Mr Soros.

"The United Kingdom's fateful decision to break away from the European Union makes an eventual dissolution of the 28 member bloc "practically irreversible," billionaire financier George Soros wrote on Saturday.

In a somber post at Project Syndicate, Soros, who rose to prominence by speculating against the British pound—immortalizing him as the man who broke the Bank of England—speculated that the U.K.'s referendum to split from the EU is likely to hasten the breakup of the entire EU.

Brexit, combined with Europe's festering migrant crisis, has created a "catastrophic scenario" that has grave consequences for Britain and the world economy, Soros wrote, "making the disintegration of the EU practically irreversible."

Noting that Scotland is agitating to leave the U.K., Soros said the county itself "may not survive" the decision to leave Europe.

"The consequences for the real economy [from Brexit] will be comparable only to the financial crisis of 2007-2008," wrote the billionaire, adding that a domino effect could potentially end decades of continental unification. 

"But the implications for Europe could be far worse," Soros cautioned. "Tensions among member states have reached a breaking point, not only over refugees, but also as a result of exceptional strains between creditor and debtor countries within the euro zone."

'We must not give up'

Getty Images

A European Union flag, with a hole cut in the middle, flies at half-mast outside a home in Knutsford Cheshire after today's historic referendum on June 24, 2016 in Knutsford, United Kingdom.

Soros, a polarizing figure who is known for financing left-wing causes, is an enthusiastic backer of European integration. In 1992, he dealt a fatal blow to Britain's participation in Europe's exchange rate mechanism—the precursor to the single currency.

The billionaire also appears to be profiting from the turmoil stemming from the U.K.'s vote.

Last week, CNBC reported that Soros and fellow "macro" fund manager and Stanley Druckenmiller, who also runs a private firm managing family money through investments in a range of assets, hold bullish positions in gold. Bullion is a safe-haven asset that rises during times of market volatility, but exactly how those positions are performing for both men aren't yet clear.

Brexit "is sure to be fraught with further uncertainty and political risk, because what is at stake was never only some real or imaginary advantage for Britain, but the very survival of the European project," he added. "Brexit will open the floodgates for other anti-European forces within the Union."

Already, political opposition is mobilizing in other countries opposed to further European integration. Barely a day after the U.K. referendum, parties in places like the Netherlands and Austria suggested they might hold votes of their own. 

A report in the U.K. publication The Express said the German government was bracing itself for the possibility of at least 5 more countries threatening to leave the EU. In his article, Soros said a potential threat also comes from Italy, where the populist Five Star Movement may rise to power as a "full blown banking crisis" looms.

The billionaire ended on a slightly optimistic note by saying that proponents of European integration "must not give up. Admittedly, the EU is a flawed construction."

However, he added, "all of us who believe in the values and principles that the EU was designed to uphold must band together to save it by thoroughly reconstructing it. I am convinced that as the consequences of Brexit unfold in the weeks and months ahead, more and more people will join us."

From: http://www.cnbc.com/2016/06/25/brexit-makes-eus-dissolution-practically-inevitable-george-soros.html 

Unintended Consequences of the UK referendum to leave the EU

It is my prediction that there will be two unintended consequences:

1.  The breakup of the UK within five years:

- Scotland becomes independent
- Northern Ireland unites with the Republic of Ireland
- Gibraltar reverts to Spain

2.   The breakup of the EU within 10 years, with the following countries opting to leave:

- Sweden
- The Netherlands
- Denmark
- France
- Italy
- Czech Republic

Anyone taking bets?

Western powers and the Middle East

The invasion of Iraq, which was meant to rein in Muslim extremism and 'rogue' Muslim rulers, resulted in the unintended consequence of the so-called Arab Spring.

The Arab Spring was meant to free Muslim countries from despots and the like. One of the unintended consequences was the rebellion against Assad in Syria.

The West, having learnt from Iraq, largely decided not to intervene. The unintended consequence ios, of course, the spreading of ISIS from Iraq to Syria.

The bombing of the Russian tourist 'plane over Egypt was meant by ISIS to warn off Russia and weaken its support of Assad.  The unintended consequence is the increase activity of Russia.

Similarly, the terrorist attack in Paris was intended to warn off Western powers. Instead France is fully engaged and there are signs that the UK may join them and Russia and the US.
Given the universal application to the law of unintended consequences, God (and He alone) knows where all this will lead.

Related articles

• Top Former General: Syria Is A Geopolitical Chernobyl
• The Islamic State: Understanding And Countering Its Strategy - Analysis (Author: Dr Sanu Kainikara)

Transparency International Socks China for Corruption - Businessweek

Ironically, the more China pursues its anti-corruption campaign, the more the rest of the world thinks it is very corrupt!

via Transparency International Socks China for Corruption - Businessweek.

Given all the emphasis Chinese President Xi Jinping has put on fighting corruption over the past two years, you might think China was getting a lot cleaner. More than 80,000 officials have already been punished for breaking party rules, the graft-fighting Central Commission for Discipline Inspection announced earlier this week.

But in reality, corruption may be getting worse, according to a survey by Transparency International released today. In its annual Corruption Perceptions Index, the Berlin-based watchdog found that China dropped four points, to 36, on a scale from zero, or highly corrupt, to 100, or very clean, over last year.

That put it alongside Turkey, Rwanda, Malawi, and Angola as the countries where conditions deteriorated most. Meanwhile, China fell from 80th least-clean country to the 100th worst place amongst the 175 countries rated, the report shows. Cleanest was Denmark, while North Korea and Somalia were tied for worst.

STORY: China's Civil Service Loses Luster Amid Graft Crackdown

“We have heard a lot about government efforts to prosecute corruption and corruption scandals in China. Its commitment to catch ‘tigers and flies’—public officials big and small—indicates the government is serious,” wrote Transparency’s Srirak Plipat in a blog post on the organization’s website today.

Still, the worsening situation poses “a hugely challenging question: how effective is a top-down approach when you don’t have transparency, accountable government and free media and civil society?” Plipat wrote.

The larger picture across Asia was hardly more encouraging. All told, 18 of the 28 Asian countries ranked fell below 40 on the index. The “scores of countries from Asia Pacific, the world’s fastest growing region, are a resounding message to leaders that, despite many public declarations and commitments, not enough is being done to fight corruption,” Plipat wrote.

In Delhi, an unintended consequence of free parking: violent deaths

From: http://scroll.in/article/671937

Incidents of violence and scuffles because of parking spats have become more common as the number of cars on Delhi's roads continues to grow.

Rajender Bhatia was sitting in his ground floor apartment in central Delhi on Sunday morning when his neighbour turned up. Kartik, who lived on the second floor of the same building, had come to pick a bone with Bhatia about the parking situation around their building. The argument quickly escalated and, according to the police, a couple of other men also joined the fracas that turned into a proper scuffle.

Then suddenly the 55-year-old Bhatia collapsed, prompting the others to run away and his family to take him to the hospital. The doctors there declared Bhatia dead on arrival and a case was registered against Kartik and the other men, who have since been arrested and booked with culpable homicide not amounting to murder.

Bhatia, unfortunately, is not the first to have died in an argument over parking in Delhi: there have been seven other violent incidents related to it this year alone. And, considering the state of parking in the capital, it’s unlikely Bhatia’s case will be the last.

Police records suggest that 15 people have died in the capital over parking-related issues in the past five years, with many more incidents of violent clashes. Other than the capital’s generally high stress levels, which have given it the reputation of being particularly prone to violence and spats, the huge number of cars being added to the roads combined with limited space is mainly what is behind this unique category of crimes. It isn’t uncommon to see car tires being slashed or a parked car being keyed by angry residents who see it as a way to complain about parking.

The problem according to urban planning experts, however, isn’t one of inadequate space for parking. A 2009 study carried out by the Centre for Science and Environment concluded that, based on standards laid down by the Delhi government, about 10% of all land in the capital is used by stationary vehicles — just a little less than the forest cover in the city, which is about 11.5% of all land.

Instead, it is a question of incentives and planning. Delhi gives far too much leeway to car drivers even though under 15% of all trips in the capital happen in cars, with the metro, buses and other modes of transport moving much more of the city’s population around.

Yet much of the city has completely free parking — using public land that could otherwise have been given over to other uses — and in the places where you do have to pay to park, the revenues don’t even come close to what the land might otherwise be able to generate.

“Today parking policy in Delhi is only about supplying parking space, all the building bylaws and everything is all about providing space for parking,” said Anumita Roy Chowdhury, executive director at the Centre for Science and Environment. “People have begun to think as if parking is their right that the government should provide for, which is absolutely wrong.”

The city’s transport policy is also terribly weighted in favour of car drivers, as the cancellation of the Bus Rapid Transit corridor showed. The city expects up to 69 sq m to be available to a single car per day, presuming it will park in at least three different places, compared with its standard allotment of just 25 sq m houses for the poor.

“Delhi, in other words, allots more public land per day for parking cars than it does to house its poor. And all this for only 20 per cent of city's population that has a family car, based on figures of the 2008 Household Survey by the Department of Transport,” wrote the Unified Traffic and Transportation Infrastructure (Planning and Engineering) Centre, in a study in 2010.

A study by the Central Road Research Institute also pointed out that the average car stays parked for more than 95% of the time. Yet policy favours cars, provides cheap parking and encourages the buying of vehicles to the extent that car owners have come to expect convenient places to park — something that will be harder and harder for the capital to provide every year to come.

A change in the nature of residential areas is also playing a huge part. As car ownership per person grows, it has become common to see roadsides not meant for parking being occupied by vehicles of all sorts. This ends up obstructing carriageways and entrances, increasing frustration among residents and leading to incidents like Bhatia’s.

“Numerous disputes over parking in residential neighbourhoods with serious law and order consequences have become common in Delhi,” the CSE study into parking policy pointed out. "Parking in residential areas is not managed well, norms are not enforced. Most of the time it is left to the vagaries and negotiating skills of individual car owners. In many residential areas, one is free to park as many vehicles as one wishes on the road and that too at no cost.”

Roy Chowdhury said that it was this conditioning, leading car owners to believe they deserve a parking spot by right, that leads to confrontation and violence when they don’t get it. Because supply is finite, however, she argues that the only way to deal with it is to change the way people think about parking.

“The research clearly shows that parking demand is insatiable. You can never satisfy the insatiable demand for parking. The city doesn’t have enough space to park the cars,” she said. “At one level we should be able to improve the alternative to park, we need to be improving public transport and at the same time you have to manage the usage of cars better. People must pay the right price for using the roads and using  public space.”

Related articles

• Man dies in scuffle over parking
• Delhi businessman, 57, dies after neighbours beat him in row over parking

Google Removes Robert Peston's BBC Article Because Someone Wanted It 'Forgotten'

Instead of being 'forgotten', the item has been re-tweeted many, many times!

From: http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/07/03/google-right-to-be-forgotten-robert-peston_n_5553880.html

1

The BBC's economics editor has spoken of his "shock" after learning Google is removing his work because someone wanted it "forgotten."

Robert Peston woke up to an eyebrow-raising email from the search engine giant this morning, informing him his work had been eradicated from history, complying with new measures that require sites to honour the "right to be forgotten" online.

His blog post about former Merrill Lynch boss Stan O'Neal, published almost seven years ago on the BBC website, is now unsearchable in Google. Peston said that this effectively means that no one will see the blog post from now on.

“To all intents and purposes the article has been removed from the public record, given that Google is the route to information and stories for most people,” he wrote.

The reporter has now asked why he was being "cast into oblivion" by the search engine.

A landmark European court decision in May said Google must listen and sometimes comply when individuals ask it to remove links to newspaper articles or websites containing personal information.

The "right to be forgotten" is based on the premise that outdated information about people should be removed from the internet after a certain time.

Google sent Peston the following message:

Notice of removal from Google Search: we regret to inform you that we are no longer able to show the following pages from your website in response to certain searches on European versions of Google

Perston's article described how O'Neal was forced to leave the investment bank after it endured significant losses on the back of careless investments.

Blogging on the matter yesterday Peston accused Google of having "killed this example of my journalism", but conceded that the technology giant had opposed the court ruling.

The latest blog, which links to the 2007 article, was last night shared on Peston's Twitter feed and retweeted more than 500 times.

The journalist said he did not know who had requested the removal of the story, entitled "Merrill's mess", from the search engine, declaring it "all a bit odd".

He said: "Maybe I am a victim of teething problems. It is only a few days since the ruling has been implemented - and Google tells me that since then it has received a staggering 50,000 requests for articles to be removed from European searches."

Speaking shortly after the ruling in May, Google spokesman Al Verney said it was ''disappointing ... for search engines and online publishers in general''.

Peston, who said he was "rather shocked" to be told that the article was being removed from search results, said that it was "completely possible" the complaint could have come from any of the readers who commented on the post or were named in the comments, rather than in the story itself.

But the journalist said it was still possible to find web pages Google had been asked to remove from European searches.

He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "Because this only applies in Europe, because this is an EU ruling, if you put in google.com/ncr that basically means you are not searching the regional version of Google and even if you are in the UK you can still find anything.

"So it sort of makes a whole nonsense of the ruling, to be honest."

Google informed Peston that since the rule came into force it has received around 50,000 removal requests, and that it has hired "an army of paralegals" to process them. Peston has contacted Google to ask if he can appeal against the blocking of his article. He is currently awaiting a response.