Brexit the economy and house prices part 6

StevieJ

The National Crime Agency (NCA) has launched an investigation into Leave.EU and Better for the Country (BFTC) over suspected electoral law offences.
Also under investigation are Aaron Banks, Elizabeth Bilney and other unnamed individuals.
In a statement, the NCA said: "The NCA has initiated an investigation concerning the entities Better for the Country (BFTC) and Leave.EU; as well as Arron Banks, Elizabeth Bilney and other individuals. This follows our acceptance of a referral of material from the Electoral Commission.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/11/01/leaveeu-among-pro-brexit-bodies-investigated-nca-suspected-electoral/

Thrugelmir

Holding a hard political line. Has negative impact it seems.

Irish consumer morale sinks to near four-year low as Brexit weighs


https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-ireland-economy-consumersentiment/irish-consumer-morale-sinks-to-near-four-year-low-as-brexit-weighs-idUKKCN1N637F

gfplux

Pot hole anybody

https://www.essexlive.news/news/essex-news/live-m25-dartford-crossing-traffic-2172747

The pothole is "the size of a car", meaning a difficult and time-consuming repair job for crews at the scene.

cogito

gfplux wrote: »

No apology offered.

If Britain only had problems like Germany.

You will not improve Britain by saying other countries have the same problem.

I live only a few kilometres from Germany so can say again. I see no potholes in German Roads.

The trains continue to run on time and are VERY clean thank you.

The underground in a number of citys are a joy to ride. Can you say that about London? I can not.
Even Berlin has a better underground than London.
If you often travel to Germany you know this but have problems with it and need to criticise it.

When will you Stop diverting the conversation away from Britain. Use that energy to lobby your MP for a BENEFICIAL trade deal with the EU and the rest of the world.
The negotiations start on April 1st 2019.

I really don't know why I waste time on you. Last time I drove on German roads was last summer when I was up and down the autobahn from Frankfurt to Karlsruhe and Strasbourg several times. The drive should take two hours but I never managed to do it in less than four thanks to traffic delays due to roadworks. Apparently they were fixing potholes and other wear and tear.

I'm happy to discuss the UK any time but when people try to pretend that The UK has problems that don't exist elsewhere in the EU, I will call them out on it.

Thrugelmir

Originally Posted by gfplux

I live only a few kilometres from Germany so can say again. I see no potholes in German Roads.

Still seven hundred kms from Dresden and nearly 600 kms to Hamburg.

Rather like your knowledge of the UK from afar. Safe to assume pretty poor.

My guess is your travelling is mainly done by air to some Med destination.

Herzlos

He's a few km from Germany, so it's fair to say he spends more time driving in Germany than you do. Your claim was that German roads are poor, and his response is that the ones he use regularly aren't.
Maybe some parts of the German road system is poor, but certainly not all of it.

cogito wrote: »

The drive should take two hours but I never managed to do it in less than four thanks to traffic delays due to roadworks.

So are you saying that they fix potholes or leave them in a bad state? The autobahns in particular are well looked after for the most part, and that naturally means maintenance work.



I've covered a lot of mileage in Germany and never noticed the roads being particularly bad, certainly better than parts of the UK.
But then I haven't covered all of Germany so I can't comment on all of it.

A_Pandiculation

I wouldn't normally post here but saw the comments about potholes so with my experiences I thought I would share. If it's not appropriate or not welcome please say.

I have relatives in south-east Luxembourg and visit regularly, usually a couple of times a year.
Luxembourg's roads aren't as always as good as gfplux suggests, both 2013 and 2015 being notable years for the problems caused in Luxembourg. It seems strange to me that gfplux doesn't mention that.

Also we visited in early October. The motorways then from Belgium into Luxembourg (our route of preference) were chaos with Luxembourg papers describing the situation as IIRC being in a third world country. At the same time railway services were disrupted, despite a line that had just reopened after being closed for repairs. From memory some 40,000 Belgian commuters were affected daily for quite a while.

Now I say this not to suggest that by comparison Britain isn't so bad or to divert attention from our Brexit issues. But to wonder why someone would harp on about the state of roads in the UK when roads are poor in lots of places and even the country they live in. It seems strange to me because I certainly wouldn't go onto a Benelux forum of any sort and grumble about anything of theirs, knowing full well that our own is no better.

Berlin for example is like many cities including ours often dirty, and their U-Bahn like Munichs is definitely no cleaner than London's underground. Yes I visit there too. In Berlin there's lots of graffiti and in many places not just the underground there's a pervasive stink of urine. But again it's the same for almost any city so I don't get why anyone would try and suggest one is somehow better than the other when they're in honesty not very different from each other.
So I'm sorry but I just don't get the attempted one upmanship that one road is better than another just because of what country you're in or that realistically it has anything to do with Brexit any way.


Now to lighten the tone and show that Germany does have potholes I will try to post a report from just a few months ago about Germany's most beautiful pothole.
Read it and smile.
https://trans.info/en/the-most-beautiful-pothole-in-germany-a-driver-parked-a-car-above-it-to-save-it-from-being-repaired-101220

StevieJ

I don't care what roads are like on the continent, all I know is that UK roads are an absolute disgrace. They have deteriorated drastically over that past few years, presumably pushed to the back of the queue for funds by councils that are now operating on the bare bones of what they need to operate. My guess is that councils have decided that poor roads will create more public reaction than under-spending in other areas, thus more pressure for extra funds from the Govt.

buglawton

Herzlos wrote: »

.....I've covered a lot of mileage in Germany and never noticed the roads being particularly bad, certainly better than parts of the UK.
But then I haven't covered all of Germany so I can't comment on all of it.

This brings back memories of the 1980s when large parts of West Germany's official motorway network were still a series of dual lane concrete blocks exactly as laid down by Hitlers' regime. Clonk-clonk.

At that time Germany had abysmal road fatality statistics, partly down the the 'driven' personality attitudes prevailing. Things like no speed limit zones where that dot in the mirror as you gently overtake something becomes an extremely impatient BMW arriving at 130 MPH to be nearly touching your rear bumper. And dense holiday traffic all doing exactly 80 MPH with 2m gaps between cars on both lanes of the 'motorway'. I was always happy to get back to Blighty driving.

Herzlos

I didn't drive until the 2000s, so I've no experience. What were British roads like in the 80s?
I can certainly imagine the German roads were in a pretty bad state when the wall was still up.