Bridges are going everywhere.

[bedouin]

In London there is an excess of tax over expenditure of about £4500 per person. In Scotland there is a deficit of £2800 per person.

Just think what we could do in London with the same level of expenditure as Scotland has

 

[awol]

In London there is an excess of tax over expenditure of about £4500 per person. In Scotland there is a deficit of £2800 per person.

Please, please, do share your source(s) for these fascinating figures.

 

[bedouin]

Please, please, do share your source(s) for these fascinating figures.

ONS:

Country and regional public sector finances, UK - Office for National Statistics

 

[DJE]

"Plans are being considered"
A 17km crossing in water 70m deep with strong tidal streams and frequent storms won't need a lot of consideration IMHO.

A few juicy contracts for somebody's favourite consultants then quietly drop the idea as the non-starter that it always was.

 

[awol]

ONS:

Country and regional public sector finances, UK - Office for National Statistics

Your interpretation is interesting but selective. For example, your source shows the Income tax take per person in London as £11796 while expenditure was £19231 with both figures lower forScotland and every other area of the Union. Lots of other conclusions from the data are available but, as always, there is a warning = "Collectively, the sources and methods used to estimate country and regional receipts, expenditure and net fiscal balance mean that different measurements are each subject to a degree of uncertainty."

 

[bedouin]

Your interpretation is interesting but selective. For example, your source shows the Income tax take per person in London as £11796 while expenditure was £19231 with both figures lower forScotland and every other area of the Union. Lots of other conclusions from the data are available but, as always, there is a warning = "Collectively, the sources and methods used to estimate country and regional receipts, expenditure and net fiscal balance mean that different measurements are each subject to a degree of uncertainty."

Not my interpretation but that of the HoC

https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-8027/

HoC quoting ONS is pretty much as reliable and unbiased as you get,

There is a "degree of uncertainty" and there is the difference between -4500 and +2800

Loads of other numbers out there will confirm the same thing.

I guess you must be Scottish if you question figures that are pretty obvious to everyone else

 

[dgadee]

In London there is an excess of tax over expenditure of about £4500 per person. In Scotland there is a deficit of £2800 per person.

Just think what we could do in London with the same level of expenditure as Scotland has

It's a bit more complicated than that - think of all the legal issues which go down to London to the High Court and which is claimed as London generated income, for example.

Unfortunately I suspect much of it is in the hands of a few Londoners working in the city of London and perhaps making its way offshore. Thatcher turned the UK into a service economy and Scotland which used to be a manufacturing economy suffered.

 

[awol]

Not my interpretation but that of the HoC
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-8027/
HoC quoting ONS is pretty much as reliable and unbiased as you get,
There is a "degree of uncertainty" and there is the difference between -4500 and +2800
Loads of other numbers out there will confirm the same thing.
I guess you must be Scottish if you question figures that are pretty obvious to everyone else

And even the Westminster bureacracy notes "The ONS mainly allocates spending and revenues to regions using assumptions, rather than administrative data. This is because revenues are generally not collected on a regional basis – they are largely collected centrally by HMRC – and, similarly spending is generally planned to benefit a category of people or businesses irrespective of location. The data should be treated as statistical estimates only. "
Every time the ONS issue their report on regional and country finances a selection of much more invested experts than me (not difficult!) present views on the fallacy of comparing figures while the politically biased from all sides use the figures to support their arguments.

 

[bedouin]

It's a bit more complicated than that - think of all the legal issues which go down to London to the High Court and which is claimed as London generated income, for example.

Unfortunately I suspect much of it is in the hands of a few Londoners working in the city of London and perhaps making its way offshore. Thatcher turned the UK into a service economy and Scotland which used to be a manufacturing economy suffered.

Not really - if you look at the figures for the South East (exc London) those are also an excess of £2800. I suspect the concentration of jobs in London rather shifts some of the tax from SE to London

 

[alan_d]

... agree that the A9 should never have been single carriage. It's never a good idea to scrimp on communications.

I suspect that when the Edinburgh to Inverness road was designated as the A9 in 1923 a single carriageway was thought to be perfectly adequate. I don't think the first dual carriageway in the UK opened until 1925.

 

[dgadee]

I, of course, meant dual carriage when the road was improved. My late uncle told me he rembered when there were only two private cars in his bit of Caithness. Not much use for major roads then.

 

[ProDave]

Driving up the A9 to Inverness reminds me as a younger man driving up the A1 to Newcastle before that was dual carriageway. We are a generation behind.

 

[The Q]

The A1 dual carriageway still stops just north of Morpeth.. then there are intermittent sections to Edinburgh. It's improved a lot since I used to continue on up the A1 to Princes Street and beyond..

 

[ProDave]

The A1 dual carriageway still stops just north of Morpeth.. then there are intermittent sections to Edinburgh. It's improved a lot since I used to continue on up the A1 to Princes Street and beyond..

The road I am thinking of is what is now the A1M, I can't remember what it was before it was even dual carriageway let alone motorway.

 

[penfold]

Coming back to the title of the thread...

Not everywhere Drivers rescued after Norway bridge collapse

There's time and a place for wood and it's not in road bridges.

"Plans are being considered"
A 17km crossing in water 70m deep with strong tidal streams and frequent storms won't need a lot of consideration IMHO.

A few juicy contracts for somebody's favourite consultants then quietly drop the idea as the non-starter that it always was.

Noggies would bore a tunnel.

 

[boomerangben]

I was speaking to a native Orcadian last week and it seems the inter island ferries are in need of investment before a bridge to the mainland.

 

[Stemar]

I was speaking to a native Orcadian last week and it seems the inter island ferries are in need of investment before a bridge to the mainland.

So, in the great tradition of planners everywhere, the investment will be stopped because the bridge is to be built, but then the bridge can't be built because the ferries aren't up to carrying the material

 

[The Q]

The road I am thinking of is what is now the A1M, I can't remember what it was before it was even dual carriageway let alone motorway.

Unfortunately I can remember it, trailing through the middle of Newcastle or off down to the Tyne Tunnel.
It was just the plain A1, some bits of which still exist under another name. 48 years and counting of using that road, used to be a couple of times a month, now it's down to a couple of times a year..

Hmm Orcadian ferries in need of investment... I think they've spent all the money on the undelivered Hebridean ones..

 

[dgadee]

I was speaking to a native Orcadian last week and it seems the inter island ferries are in need of investment before a bridge to the mainland.

More bridges!

 

[TiggerToo]

Wouldn't get a bridge there, it would probably be a tunnel, easy to dig through the chalk..

population Orkneys, 20,000 approx,
population IoW, 140,000...

but... why?