ShoeburyLad

@sittingbourneTA @archer_rs The problem is that when they do leave they have a habit of driving on the right hand side of the road...

@archer_rs As a Kent police officer in 90's I had to go to Lakenheath for enquiries & spent several days there (it's huge). We were assigned a Master Sergeant as liaison and he told us lots of the personnel never leave the base for their entire deployments as everything they need is there

Fox News reporter surprised to discover that RAF Lakenheath in the UK is, a) an RAF base b) not "US Sovereign territory like the US Embassy" c) the property of the British government

@dadaostephen @SuellaBraverman There are also consequences of reducing overseas students, Essex Uni is closing the entire Southend campus due to falling overseas students. Part of the campus trains nurses & clinicians who intern in our local hospitals plus the East 15 theatre skills courses. All going...

Hi @SuellaBraverman , 48 hours ago I asked you to substantiate or withdraw your claim that “250,000 foreign students took £4bn in UK loans.” That time has now passed. You have provided no evidence, no clarification, and no correction. I have taken the time to examine the data myself. I have reviewed materials from the Student Loans Company, the Department for Education, the House of Commons Library, the UK Statistics Authority, and reporting from Times Higher Education. Across these sources, one thing is clear. Your statement is presented in a way that gives the public a deeply misleading impression. Let’s deal with this carefully. The £4bn figure you reference relates to the total value of student loans issued to non UK nationals. It is not a direct cost to the taxpayer. These are loans. They are repaid over time based on income. Presenting that figure as if it were money handed out or lost is not an accurate reflection of how the system works. Then there is your use of the phrase “foreign students.” This is where the distortion becomes more serious. The fact (which you know quite well) is those eligible for UK student finance are not newly arrived international students. They are people with settled status, indefinite leave to remain, refugee status, or long term lawful residence in the UK. They live here. They work here. They pay into the system. And under the law, they are entitled to access student finance. Standard international students on student visas are generally not eligible for these loans. By leaving out that distinction, you create a very different picture in the minds of the public. One where large numbers of people are arriving from abroad and immediately accessing public funds. That is not what the data shows. You also cited a figure of 250,000 without pointing to a clearly published dataset or transparent methodology. Numbers like this carry weight. They should be used with care, not as loose estimates in politically charged statements. I am not interested in party politics. But I am concerned about what this kind of messaging is doing to the country. When lending is presented as spending, and long term residents are presented as outsiders, it fuels resentment. It deepens division. It creates tension where clarity is needed. And ordinary people end up carrying the consequences of that confusion. Like I was being racially attacked and profiled in my initial response to you in X by supporters of your party who were obviously misled and triggered by your misinformation. I did consider legal action. But the reality is that the law is not designed to deal easily with this kind of broad public misrepresentation. You know that, which is why ignoring a challenge like mine carries little immediate consequence. That does not make it acceptable. I will be submitting a formal complaint to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards regarding your use of misleading statistical claims in public communication. The public deserves accuracy. Not selective framing. Not distortion. And certainly not narratives that risk turning people against each other on the basis of incomplete facts. Stephen Dada.

@MonkEmma That fare sounds like it was an Advanced ticket in which case it is only valid for the booked train. Not only did she not get a seat but probably travelled with an invalid ticket & was lucky not to get a penalty fare from a ticket inspector...

Wow - that’s quite something…🙄 Books a train on BH Mon from Cornwall to London Decides to get a different train - that is clearly already full. Complains PUBLICLY to her 60K followers, tagging the train company, that there were no seats on the full train she hadn’t booked on to!

@afneil The Germans should up the stakes & tell the US that if they've made the decision to go then they won't be dictated to over the timetable & the US has 6 weeks not 6 months to get the troops out.

Good luck continuing to wage your war against Iran without your German bases. Well nigh impossible. US troops aren’t in Germany to protect Germans. They’ve been there to project US power. Bye bye.

@jwhitey98 @billybragg Perhaps Park Run should just make it an open category for all and just time bib numbers.

And now they come for Parkrun. PARKRUN. Threatening community run events with legal action cannot possibly be part of protecting women’s sport. For these campaigners, the only thing that seems to matter is the erasure of the trans community from public life.

@I_amMukhtar Then tries to go up the fire escape and force entrance, all while filming himself on his phone...

Epsom protesters went to the wrong hotel.

@BBCBreakfast Good to see how a second generation immigrant has assimilated so seamlessly into our Christian values...

Reform UK has pledged an immediate review of all asylum claims from the last five years should the party win the next general election. Home Affairs spokesman Zia Yusuf told #BBCBreakfast around 400,000 people would be liable for deportation under the plans bbc.co.uk/news/articles/…

@TRIGGERHAPPYV1 Deserves a ticket for parking in residents streets clogging them up while going on holiday. His car parked there was obviously where a disabled resident would normally park who had requested the bay.

A man returned from holiday to find four parking tickets on his car after a disabled parking bay was painted directly underneath his vehicle while he was away

@JamieStrud Are the costs for all these generic mailings from Reform divided & set against the allowable election costs for each of their candidates? I have received 4 so far, at 2nd class post, for a ward with c.9k voters that's c.£31k in post...

Reform cares that much about local communities that they’re using the same letter across the entire country - with slight variations. Letters here from Sheffield, West Mids, and Southend. I have also seen the same letter in Hull.

@AlbertRamsbott1 @MrTibblesNewEra If he has driven down a 'school street' that has traffic movement ban at beginning & end of school day then, yes, that is a traffic offence, normally ANPR camera enforced.

@MrTibblesNewEra @Soalloverthis Is driving near a school an offence now?

Have you considered not being an arsehole? @Soalloverthis

@ClairellaCakes @YourSouthend They'd probably just think it is a different type of sand that moves faster than normal sand, the Usain Bolt of sands...

@YourSouthend Maybe putting up signs saying - “Warning - Quick Sand” would be more helpful than a sign that says “Wet Sand” 🤦🏼‍♀️🤷‍♀️

More people became stuck in the dangerous “quick sand” at the closed Three Shells Lagoon in Southend, despite fencing and warning signs already being in place. The latest incident happened on Friday, raising fresh safety concerns. According to witnesses, a family were climbing on the rocks when a child slipped off and into the wet sand. While they managed to get free, two women who tried to help quickly became trapped themselves. Barry French, who witnessed what happened, said: “One kid fell off the rocks and into the wet sand. They were okay, but both the women then got stuck and their kids were screaming hysterically. “Access to the rocks or the whole area needs to be blocked off.” The area on the beach had already been fenced off, with warnings in place about the danger of the ‘wet sand’. Southend City Council previously confirmed that the lagoon had effectively been closed, due to previous incidents of people becoming trapped in the quick sand. The £1.9 million lagoon, which first opened in 2016, will not reopen until safety improvements are made. A council spokesperson said: “In the meantime, our engineers are looking at a range of options for the lagoon. “Any options are likely to require planning applications and coastal licensing approvals.” Despite this, Friday’s incident shows people are still getting into the restricted area, with growing calls from locals for stronger measures to prevent access altogether.

@KemiBadenoch James Cleverley was instrumental in the deal which was already on the table before this Government was elected, in which party's Government? Oh, I remember, a Conservative Government. Do you really think we all suffer short term memory loss??? As that seems to be your rhetoric.

If Keir Starmer’s Chagos surrender now finds its rightful place - on the ash heap of history - it will be because Conservatives led the fight against it from day one. That it took so long is another damning indictment of a prime minister, who fought to hand over British sovereign territory and pay £35 billion to use a crucial military base which was already ours. Unlike Labour, we will always put our country first. We are the only party who can be trusted to stand up for Britain’s interests abroad.

@antoguerrera @BorisJohnson @repubblica So, just for arguments sake, the UK just decided to go & start bombing Saudi Arabia & the Gulf states so they turned all their oil off & we plunged the world into intractable crisis then the US would join in to help sort it out? Yeah, OK, I've got a bridge I need to sell you...

NEW. I have interviewed @BorisJohnson on Iran, Ukraine, Trump, NATO, Brexit for @repubblica. Some highlights: 1 - Johnson: “We've all made a big mistake in Europe, as soon as it was clear that Trump had got into a trap in the Gulf, that there was a kind of checkmate in the Straits, we should have realised that Europe should try as much as possible, within reason, to help America and help America get out of the mess. There's no doubt that this is a mess, right? I don't understand how the Pentagon thought they could do this…”

@Sam07419 @SUFCRootsHall But it's a 'Mickey Mouse' cup and no one wanted to go to it. Funny that now it's a day out at Wembley Uncle Tom Cobley and all want to go...

@SUFCRootsHall 19k isn’t enough. Hope there’s a way to get more when other clubs don’t sell their allocations

🏆 We are pleased to confirm ticket information for our Isuzu FA Trophy Final against Wealdstone on Sunday, May 17. Read more 🔽

@TheRealJamieKay Logic dictates that with vehicles using no fuel that fuel duty needs replacing and pay per mile was always going to be the solution to that. To truly replace the missing duty it should be at 6-7p per mile.

£300 a year just for driving 10,000 miles. Pay-per-mile tax from 2028. Drive to work? Pay. Visit family? Pay. Live outside a big city? Pay more. Another “targeted” policy that hits ordinary people hardest.

@TheRealJamieKay But if you were driving a car that does 40mpg you would be paying £600 fuel duty, where do you think the money comes from to replace that to maintain the roads that heavier EV's wear out at a quicker rate? Most would happily per 3p per mile if fuel duty was zero...

@archer_rs We don't buy them because they don't fit on most of our roads, you know the ones in our cities built for horse and carts in the days before the US existed... Horses for courses, and all that.

Europeans are not "blocking" US supersized pick up trucks, they are for sale here. We do not buy them because of three reasons. 1 - They are poorly made 2 - They are unreliable 3 - They are stupid ft.com/content/3eb796…

@ianeditz @SwailesRuth It really isn't is it? 15 years ago we were working 36 hr 5 day week, 7hr 12m days. Changed to 36hr 4 day week, 9hr days. Travel costs, wear and tear on vehicles dropped overnight by 20%. Staff worked alternate M-T, T-F weeks with alternate 4 day weekend to cover urgent work...

@SwailesRuth I used to work a 7 day fortnight consisting of a combination of 10 & 12 hour shifts. This stuff isn't difficult

Compressed working weeks are a fairly common in the private sector and help working parents and carers. I used to work in primary schools, so I’ll try to explain it in a way you might understand. A 40 hour working week can be 4x10 hour days or 5x 8 hour days. I hope this helps.

@MainStandULTRAS Our nearest station is £1.99.9 for diesel next one a mile down the road is £1.81.9. There was nobody in the one a mile away when I drove by at 4pm, there were a dozen in the nearest one!!! People aren't prepared to drive a mile to save 18p per litre, or £9 on a 50litre fill...

Morrisons £1.89 for diesel. I thought the oil price reacted immediately? It certainly did the minute the war broke out.

@afneil Is it tied up alongside the US carrier? We could show true team working, they could use our toilets and they could give us some water. We could even do their laundry for them if they give enough water...

Well there’s a surprise: HMS Dragon, the only Royal Navy warship deployed to the region during the conflict with Iran, has taken to port for maintenance. The Type 45 destroyer, the only one the Royal Navy had available, headed for the East Mediterranean weeks after the fighting began — and took its time getting there. The Ministry of Defence, which originally denied any problems, now says there are water supply issues. So it’s gone to a safe berth to undergo repairs. No doubt the full story will emerge in the days ahead.