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Reply | Has Burnham focussed yet on the National debt?
at 20:33 22 Sep 2026
Isn't the distinction most people draw that between non-contributory benefits and contributory benefits, with the latter requiring beneficiaries to accumulate credits or make payments over many years to establish eligibility? |
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Reply | Dear me
at 17:34 22 Sep 2026
Reports of another mega dinghy on the way from the Normandy area to the south coast today. According to the radio news the dinghy. lost speed and stopped making headway for a period. It will be interesting to see if the French escort vessel again assists the migrants to get underway again, as is rumoured to have happened with the Portsmouth mega dinghy. There are rumours of two RNLI vessels on their way to the Channel mid point. I'm sorry but I do not consider a prearranged rendezvous to provide a taxi service to be a "rescue". |
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Reply | Nato seem happy
at 19:35 20 Sep 2026
Guess we will know the details of the deal soon. The rumour is that it resembles the 1951 deal but that Greenland itself had more input compared with the bilateral 1951 agreement between the US and Denmark. The thing to watch out for is whether Trump managed to negotiate access to natural resources (minerals etc) in return for the security guarantee, and if that aspect is fair. |
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Reply | Tymon
at 12:03 20 Sep 2026
Tymon has had a poor game and I'd cut him some slack on this occasion. He can't afford to misjudge too many balls over the top though if he wants to keep his starting place. |
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Reply | Lincoln City v Swansea City : Match Thread
at 17:03 19 Sep 2026
Very good result but not quite firing on all cylinders. We seemed too willing to go into a passive mode. except for the period just after half-time when no doubt the manager's words were still ringing in the players' ears. |
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Reply | Lincoln City v Swansea City : Match Thread
at 15:44 19 Sep 2026
I was going to say a disappointingly passive half with no drive from midfield but an okay defensive performance. Unfortunately, Tymon then got out-muscled and missed a routine long ball. It was a soft pen but poor play in handling a ball over the top. No real threat upfront. One positive is that Just has looked better today. |
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Reply | Most unfriendly part of UK
at 09:35 19 Sep 2026
Llandeilo isn't a bad place for a day out - nice eateries and a few unusual shops - like a chocolate shop. The nearby Dynevor castle and house are impressive.
I've had the odd uncomfortable experience in North Wales - once in Llanrwst for example, but I would nominate Dundee in Scotland. There are a lot of city pubs where a seemingly English accent doesn't go down well - something that rankled with me as I had moved there from Wales. I am talking about years ago, so may be different now, |
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Reply | Here we go again
at 08:03 19 Sep 2026
It isn't just the people near the bottom who are unhappy; the Government also seems to be driving away those who have the dosh. The Laffer Curve has real-world effects;
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/art
On another topic in the thread, I know we are all peed off with Trump, but some posters underestimate Iran's malign character. It didn't enrich uranium to 60% because it wanted to produce medical isotopes. Then there is its strategy of supporting proxies to dominate the Middle East. I think the West appeased Iran for too long. Kicking the can down the road did not work. |
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Reply | Patriots at Dover
at 12:34 18 Sep 2026
Can't help thinking that the long-term aim is to severely reduce private car ownership to the point where only the elite have this privilege. Is an over-populated country like Singapore the shape of things to come? |
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Reply | Unbelievable…
at 12:26 18 Sep 2026
The CoE just can't get it right. If it is not men who turn a blind eye to sexual abuse, it is a woman whose head is so full of woke ideas that she makes an embarrassing blunder like this. The Bishop of Dover is another of similar ilk. |
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Reply | Passport to Piddington
at 18:46 17 Sep 2026
The socially-liberal dissenter from Piddington does seem to have a stake in the game..
[Post edited 17 Sep 18:49]
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Reply | Cost of each return under one-in-one out deal with France is about £56K
at 12:05 17 Sep 2026
Re the Telegraph point, it would have been easy enough to find a direct quote from an official source as the Minister made statements in the Dáil Éireann. The point is that the claim about a Rwanda effect came from Irish Ministers in relevant departments of state.
Yes, the finding of the 24% fall in arrivals (on a viable day) was not statistically significant at the level set, but reflects the limited size of the data set and is still highly suggestive. Wood writes: "The lack of statistical significance in some of the findings of this analysis may not necessarily mean the associations are unimportant, but just that there is currently insufficient statistical power with the available data". The weather factor is already built into the multivariate model by identifying "viable days". We know that weather is one of the most powerful factors, but are interested in whether policy change can make a difference given that weather is outside human control . The modeling is done by extrapolating known patterns to get a predicted number of crossings on particular dates and then examining the effects of particular factors such as the Rwanda Scheme or the end of Dublin III. Interested board readers can see the article for themselves. At least it is data based, unlike a couple of earlier published articles which said there was no deterrent effect. [Post edited 17 Sep 12:09]
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Reply | Cost of each return under one-in-one out deal with France is about £56K
at 10:09 17 Sep 2026
The pro-immigration lobby, including Left-leaning media and some researchers, are desperate to say that Rwanda had no impact on Ireland, but Government Ministers such as Helen McEntee and Michael Martin were convinced that it did. McEntre went so far as to claim that 80% of arrivals at that time were coming from the UK. Contemporaneous interviews with migrants in the UK print media suggested that some at least feared deportation there.
https://www.infomigrants.net/e
https://www.standard.co.uk/new
https://www.irishtimes.com/ire
https://thesudantimes.com/afri
A recent study suggests that there was a deterrent effect.
Wood, R. M. (2025). “Factors Affecting Illegal Migration to the UK by Small-Boat Crossing of the English Channel: Descriptive, Inferential and Predictive Analyses.” International Migration Review. DOI: 10.1177/01979183251394003. (paywall). So:
https://www.researchgate.net/p
Wood writes: "...this analysis finds 24% higher arrivals follow the cancelling of the Rwanda scheme (with the change of government in 2024), versus previous comments that “the launch of the Rwanda policy does not appear to have had any deterrent impact” (Brooks 2023) ."
Summary here: https://www.express.co.uk/news |
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Thread | Cost of each return under one-in-one out deal with France is about £56K
at 10:58 16 Sep 2026
Yesterday the Home Secretary told a H of C select committee that the cost of each return under the deal with France is about £56,000. It is unclear whether this takes account of the full upfront payment to France, although the Telegraph does mention some specific activities that are included in the cost calculation.
https://committees.parliament.
Story from expat forum below:
The Home Secretary has told MPs that the Government’s “one in, one out” scheme has cost about £56,000 for every person sent from the UK to France since it began in August 2025.
Shabana Mahmood made the disclosure during a hearing of the House of Commons Home Affairs Select Committee, where she was asked whether the policy offers value for taxpayers.
Cost Per Return
Mahmood said she would update the committee once the latest figures were available, but that the cost figure quoted was based on returns made so far.
She said: “I’ll need to write to the committee on the most recent figures.” She added that for the number of people returned to date, the cost was “about £56,000”.
Since the scheme started, the Home Office has removed about 1,400 people to France. Mahmood also noted that some individuals have subsequently returned to the UK, including via lorries or small boats.
The Home Secretary later defended the spending by arguing that it was “still cheaper, or just about the same as supporting someone in a hotel for a year”, in the context of alternative accommodation costs.
How the “One In, One Out” Deal Works
Under the arrangement, the UK removes a person who arrived in the country via small boats and sends them back to France. In exchange, the UK grants entry to an asylum seeker who applies through legal routes.
The pilot was due to run for a limited period, but it has already been extended once and is now scheduled to end in October. Its longer-term future is still undecided.
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The Home Secretary said the programme had struggled to scale up for higher removal numbers. She described it as “operationally difficult” to increase removals, pointing to constraints including detention capacity.
She told MPs that, while the pilot had produced results, “the numbers are still relatively small” and that the scheme had “challenges”.
EU Plans And Dublin Rejection
France has said it wants the bilateral model replaced over time by a broader EU-UK returns agreement.
Mahmood said the UK should not assume that an EU-wide mechanism would solve the Channel crisis. She rejected suggestions that an EU system would be a “silver bullet”, telling MPs it would not eliminate the problem.
She said that the scheme had already returned more people than Britain had achieved under the EU’s earlier Dublin arrangements, which existed before the UK left the bloc. She also said attempts to continue Dublin-style returns after Brexit had been rejected by EU leaders.
France Seeks To End The Pilot
Earlier in the week, it emerged that Laurent Nuñez, France’s interior minister, had told Mahmood that he wants to end the scheme.
Nuñez previously told a French parliamentary inquiry in June that France wanted to move away from what he described as a bilateral relationship with the UK. He said France did not want to “carry it alone” and argued that the programme should be integrated into an agreement between the EU and UK.
According to the position relayed to Mahmood, the pilot agreement signed in August 2025 was “not intended to be renewed beyond October 1, 2026”.
Separate Offer For Voluntary Departure
Mahmood also told MPs about a separate pilot under which some rejected asylum-seeking families could be offered up to £40,000 to leave the UK voluntarily.
She said only “relatively small numbers” had taken up that offer. She described the trade-off for families as the chance to receive £40,000 to support resettlement in their country of origin, in exchange for access they would otherwise have to services such as free healthcare and education for children.
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Reply | Passport to Piddington
at 09:50 16 Sep 2026
They only have to walk around the bay from their usual congregation area near the Civic Centre. |
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