General News

It’s polling day!

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A photo of a sign saying 'Polling Station' on the side of a building

Today’s the day when you can vote in the UK’s General Election (assuming you haven’t already voted by post). The polling stations opened at 7am, and you have until 10pm to get out there and vote.

If you’re not sure where your polling station is, use WhereDoIVote.co.uk – just pop your postcode in. Similarly, WhoCanIVoteFor.co.uk will tell you who will be on your ballot paper, and (most likely) some more information about the candidates and what they stand for.

You don’t need to take your polling card with you, but you must bring some photo ID with you. The Electoral Commission has an extensive list of what forms of ID are accepted, but the main ones include your passport and driving licence.

I’ll be off to vote in person this morning. Tomorrow, I’ll try to find the time to write about the result, once we have a picture of which party (or coalition of parties) is likely to be in government. I may or may not stay up for the exit polls tonight.

The 7 election candidates in Halifax

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A screenshot of the map of the Halifax parliamentary constituency

So, there’s a General Election coming up on the 4th July. Although I live in Sowerby Bridge, our local constituency is Halifax, as we’re lumped with the larger town just up the road.

Since the last general election at the end of 2019, there’s a couple of changes.

New constituency boundaries

The first change is the constituency boundary. Whilst there will still be 650 constituencies across the United Kingdom, the boundaries have changed to ensure that there’s a more even balance of population in each. In our case, the Halifax constituency has grown slightly, and now includes part of the Ryburn ward which used to be in the neighbouring Calder Valley constituency. This adds the villages of Sowerby and Triangle.

A new MP

Our previous Labour MP, Holly Lynch, decided not to run again. She is currently pregnant with her second child, and trying to run a re-election campaign whilst expecting doesn’t sound like my idea of fun. She’s been our MP since the 2015 general election, and was re-elected in 2017 and 2019.

So, using the list from WhoCanIVoteFor, here’s who I’ll be able to consider voting for next month:

Labour: Kate Dearden

Kate is the Labour candidate, and most likely to win; Halifax has elected a Labour MP at every election since 1987. Indeed, since 1964, the Tories have only held the seat for the four years prior to 1987. As I’m a member of the Labour party, I’ll be voting for Kate.

Though not born in Halifax, she grew up not too far away in Bingley, and has worked in trade union roles prior to becoming a political candidate.

Reform UK: James Griffith-Jones

Reform is Nigel Farage’s latest political vehicle, and is fielding candidates in just about every constituency in England, Wales and Scotland this time. Previously known as the Brexit Party, James previously stood for UKIP in a local council election in 2016, but there’s a lack of information about him on Reform’s web site. Reform may be popular with some of the more rural areas of the Halifax constituency but I can’t see him winning here. The Brexit Party previously came third in 2019, beating the Liberal Democrats, but only winning 6% of the vote.

This post was edited on Wednesday 26th June in response to a comment from James Griffith-Jones who states that he is not a ‘far-right’ candidate.

Green Party: Martin Hey

Martin is already active in local politics, having been elected a local councillor in the Shelf and Northowram ward a couple of years ago. Judging by his profile, he’s a bit of a NIMBY and concerned with the amount of housebuilding proposed for the area. In the last general election in 2019, the Greens came last with just 2% of the vote.

Independent: Perveen Hussain

In addition to the six parties fielding candidates, there’s one candidate standing as an independent, who is Perveen Hussain. According to her candidate statement, she’s a local businessperson and a campaigner, especially around Palestine. The Park ward in Halifax has a large Muslim community and she may see some support here.

Liberal Democrats: Samuel Jackson

We don’t know what Samuel Jackson’s middle name is, so I’ll leave the Nick Fury comparisons out for now. He’s a local lad, born in the constituency, who works in one of the local textile factories. As mentioned, the LibDems polled fourth in 2019 with a little under 5% of the vote.

Workers Party of Britain: Shakir Saghir

Now this is an interesting one. The Workers Party GB is George Galloway’s latest vehicle, and Shakir recently outed Labour in the Park ward in the recent local council elections. I happened to drive through the ward on election day last month, and his posters were everywhere, alongside photos of Galloway and lots of messaging around Palestine. Policy on Palestine has been one of Labour’s weak points this year.

WhoCanIVoteFor reveals that Shakir was previously a Tory, having stood several times for the Conservatives in local council elections. His switch to the Workers Party seems to have helped him get elected in Park ward, but I would be surprised if he can repeat that success across the wider Halifax constituency. Also, as someone who used to work in Bradford West during Galloway’s last stint as an MP between 2012 and 2015, he comes across as an absolute grifter.

Conservatives: Hazel Sharp

Hazel Sharp has her own, rather basic web site. She’s originally from Scotland, but now works as a physiotherapist for the NHS. Which, considering the current Tory government’s record when it comes to the NHS, is surprising. Having looked at her Facebook page, her campaign seems to be focussed on a handful of more rural areas, with nothing from the suburbs of Halifax itself.

The Tories have come second in every election since losing the seat in 1987, and only lost by 400 votes (1%) in 2015. However, with their frankly disastrous campaign and falling poll ratings, I would be very surprised if Hazel is elected as Halifax’s next MP.

FWIW, I realise that Diamond Geezer has done the same for his constituency in London, but I had planned to write this for some time. Anyway, if you live in Halifax, vote for Kate Dearden on the 4th July.

An incoming General Election

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A photo of our polling cards for the Halifax constituency for the General Election

If you’re in Britain, it hopefully hasn’t passed you by that there’s a General Election taking place on the 4th July. It was announced back on the 22 May in a very moist way by our current Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak. Had the Fixed-term Parliaments Act not been repealed, it would have probably coincided with the local and mayoral elections on the 2nd May, but instead we’re being called out for a second election in three months.

We’ve already received our voting cards through the post, but if you haven’t, or you’re not sure if you’re registered to vote, fill out the form now. You have until 23:59 on Tuesday 18th June to register, which is only a few days away.

This will be the sixth general election in which I’ve been eligible to vote. I turned 18 a year after the 2001 general election and so missed it, but I have voted in the 2005, 2010, 2015, 2017 and 2019 elections.

The folks at Democracy Club have a couple of web sites to help you with voting. Where do I vote? tells you where your polling station is, if you’re choosing to vote in person rather than use a postal vote. This information will also be on your polling card, although you don’t need your polling card with you to vote.

Who can I vote for? meanwhile lists the candidates standing in your constituency. There’s a record number of candidates standing this time – a total of 4515 across the 650 constituencies, which averages at almost seven candidates per constituency. Indeed, every constituency has at least five candidates standing, which is a first. As well as the three traditional main parties, the Green Party and Reform UK are fielding candidates in almost every constituency too.

The most is 13 candidates in Richmond and Northallerton, which happens to be where Rishi Sunak is standing. As well as the major parties, Count Binface is there, alongside the Monster Raving Loony Party (who are fielding 22 candidates in total).

In a later blog post, I’ll talk about the seven candidates that I can choose in Halifax, where I live. Although, as I’m a paid-up member of the Labour party, it’s pretty obvious who I’ll be choosing.

Election day

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An AI generated image of a ballot box overflowing with election ballots in the countryside

Today is election day for much of the UK. It’s not a general election, as much as I would like it to be; that will be sometime between mid-June and mid-January. But here in Sowerby Bridge, we have two elections taking place:

As I am a card-carrying member of the Labour Party, I’ll be voting for them in both elections. It’s likely that Labour will win both too. Our local authority, Calderdale Council, is already a Labour-controlled council, as are the four other local authorities that make up West Yorkshire. And Tracy Brabin, the incumbent mayor, will almost certainly be re-elected. Although very little local polling has taken place, Labour are polling significantly ahead of all other parties nationally.

If you are voting today, remember that you need to take some photo ID with you. This will be my second election where photo ID has been required, but may be your first. Even though the actual rate of electoral fraud was almost completely insignificant before voter ID rules were introduced.

New mayoralties

Over in York, my parents will be able to vote for an elected mayor of York and North Yorkshire for the first time. This will be a more interesting contest, as York tends to lean towards Labour and the Liberal Democrats, whereas the wider (and more rural) county of North Yorkshire leans Conservative. If David Skaith wins the mayoralty for Labour, it will mean that the Conservatives really are in trouble when they finally call a General Election.

There will also be mayoral elections for the first time in the North East and East Midlands, and the Conservative mayors of Tees Valley and the West Midlands will be hoping to be re-elected. Again, should these mayoralties fall to Labour, it’s a sign that the Conservative party are a spent electoral force.

London mayoral election

And there’s the London mayoral election, where Sadiq Khan will be looking to become the first modern mayor to be elected for a third time. The ULEZ seems to be the key issue here; it was a key part of Khan’s manifesto and most of his rivals want to scrap or curtail it. The exception seems to be Count Binface, who instead wants to expand free parking to electric vehicle users between Vine Street and the Strand. Except for those who drive a Tesla.

We’ll get most of the local council elections tomorrow, with the mayoral election results coming in over the weekend. It certainly promises to be an interesting few days in British politics.

Heat Pump mythbusting

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An AI generated image of a heat pump outside a house

Whilst we currently still have a traditional gas boiler for our heating and hot water, should it ever break down or need replacing, we’ll get a heat pump instead. Heat pumps use electricity to provide heat, and are about three times more efficient than even the newest condensing gas boilers.

There’s a really good visual explainer from The Guardian here about how heat pumps work. Basically, they work like fridges in reverse. Heat pumps extract any heat from the ground or air, and pressurise it using a compressor. The pressure heats the air, and the resultant hot air heats up water. This water is then pumped around your central heating system, or into your hot water tank. Using pressure to heat air in this way uses significantly less energy than heating it directly.

But there’s a lot of misinformation out there about heat pumps. This page on CarbonBrief.org lists 18 myths. Of these myths, 12 are outright debunked and the remaining six are in a grey area. And it seems to be an issue largely limited to the UK; in 2021, we had the lowest uptake of heat pumps out of 21 European countries.

Heat pump uptake in Britain

So why is Britain in particular so behind on heat pump uptake? It seems like political lobbying has a role. Boiler manufacturers are trying to push back phase-out dates, presumably as they have huge amounts of stock that would be otherwise worthless.

But also Britain is relatively unique in the world in that we have a privatised gas network. Different private companies each produce the gas, distribute the gas, and bill us for the gas in our homes. The gas producers can sell this gas on the open market, which is why our energy bills rocketed when Russia declared war on Ukraine and the wholesale price went up. Gas is distributed by the privatised National Grid, and in local areas by companies like Cadent and Northern Gas Networks. And then we pay consumer energy companies like British Gas, Octopus, EDF and e-On to get the gas into our homes. In other words, there’s a lot of money to be made from gas, and therefore vested interests in keeping gas supplies going.

Our move away from gas

When we bought our house in 2015, it was very reliant on gas. As well as a 40+ year old gas boiler supplying central heating and hot water, there were two gas fires, a gas oven and gas hob. We got rid of the two gas fires even before we moved in, and replaced the gas boiler with a more efficient condensing boiler. At the same time, we had a Nest smart thermostat fitted. Then in 2022, we got a new kitchen with a dual electric fan ovens and an induction hob. So our boiler is our only remaining gas-using appliance.

I suspect we would have opted for a heat pump instead if they had been more widely available and affordable. As it is, our boiler is only just out of its warranty period and so it’s not worth replacing yet. But when it is time to be replaced, we’ll get a heat pump. After all, we generate our own electricity using solar panels. It would also mean we could have our gas supply turned off, saving us from paying the daily standing charge. This is currently 29p per day, which adds up to over £100 per year.

Sign language on trains

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A photo of a screen in a train announcing the next stop is Bradford Interchange, with a video of the announcement in British Sign Language.

Northern Rail has started playing videos with announcements in British Sign Language on some of its trains. It’s a trial at present, and I happened to see one last week.

This is in addition to the existing text-based and audio announcements, and is designed to increase the accessibility of the railways for people with disabilities. Elsewhere in the north, Transpennine Express is rolling out BSL screens at stations.

When I shared this photo on Facebook, it got the usual likes and hearts from friends. But, predictably, there were some comments on the lines of ‘can’t they just read?’. And, recently, over at X/Twitter, its overly impulsive edgelord owner recently asked the same question in a tweet.

I too would have probably asked the same question until recently. However, over Christmas, I read Samantha Baines’ brilliant book ‘Living with Hearing Loss and Deafness’ (sponsored link). Baines’ book helpfully explains that British Sign Language is, well, a language – and it’s distinct from English. Furthermore, some deaf people who have always been deaf will have BSL as their first language and English as their second. If you ever go abroad, to France for example, and have to constantly translate signs into English, it can get tiring after a while. Now imagine that your first language is sign language, and you have to translate written English into the signs that you have learned, all the time.

So that’s why making BSL more widespread in Britain is important. Indeed, it is now a legally-recognised language in England, Wales and Scotland. That means BSL has the same status as British English, Welsh and Scots Gaelic.

As someone who wears hearing aids, learning British Sign Language is something that I plan to do in time. This is because my hearing could continue to deteriorate to the point where hearing aids can’t compensate. Being able to understand BSL may still allow me to communicate with some people should that happen. So whilst these BSL announcements won’t necessarily help me, they will hopefully make trains more accessible for BSL users.

Some predictions for 2024

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An AI-generated image of some felt art of a fortune teller with a crystal ball that says 2024 on it

Now that the year has started, I’m going to make some predictions for the rest of 2024. If only because it’ll be interesting to look back in a year’s time to see what actually happens.

Twitter/X won’t become an ‘everything app’

When the overly impulsive billionaire took over Twitter, he announced that it would become an ‘everything app’, like WeChat is in China. Essentially, he’s using his Twitter acquisition to realise his late 1990s dream for x.com, which would offer a huge variety of financial services.

But Musk also has a track record for over-promising and under-delivering. Look at the ‘full self driving’ mode offered on his Tesla cars, which, well, isn’t. His other firms, like The Boring Company, have also scaled down their lofty plans. So I don’t expect X/Twitter to offer much more than it does now by the end of the year.

I expect the core social media aspect of X/Twitter to continue to whither away over the year, thanks to declining user interest and lower advertising revenue. However, I still expect it to be around by the end of 2024 – I don’t think Musk is ready to throw in the towel and shut it down, or sell it at a massive loss.

Labour will win the 2024 General Election

We know that there will be a General Election in the UK this year, although not precisely when it’ll happen. Labour consistently leads in the polls, and has had some unprecedented by-election victories. I don’t think we’re looking at a repeat of 1997, when Labour won by a landslide, but I would expect a comfortable majority. How much change a new Labour government would be able to make partly depends on when the election is, but I’m not expecting the state of the country to massively improve by the end of the year.

Oh, and Sadiq Khan will win a third term as Mayor of London.

There will be a ceasefire in Palestine

Hamas’ deadly attack on Israel on the 8th October has to be condemned, but Israel’s response has been despicable with thousands of innocent civilians losing their lives. I expect Israel to find itself increasingly isolated on the world stage and a ceasefire will be inevitable by the spring of 2024. Unfortunately, I can’t see it being a route to lasting peace in the region, but any reduction in hostilities has to be better than this.

But the war in Ukraine will continue

I’m less optimistic about the war in Ukraine, which has been largely at a stalemate for the whole of 2023. Russia still intends to hang on to the territory that it has seized, including Crimea, whilst Ukraine hasn’t been able to make major advances. Meanwhile political issues in the USA mean that funding for Ukraine to carry on fighting isn’t guaranteed.

Energy prices in the UK will start to fall again

It will be a few days before we get official confirmation from the National Grid, but I’m calling it now: 2023 was the year renewables overtook fossil fuels as the largest contributor to British electricity generation. In the 12 years I’ve been running National Grid: Live at grid.iamkate.com electricity generation from fossil fuels has fallen from an average of 25.1GW to 10.2GW, while renewables have risen from 2.5GW to 10.8GW.

— Kate Morley (@kate) 2023-12-31T12:14:09.211Z

In 2023, the UK generated more electricity from renewable sources than from fossil fuels, for the first time. Whilst UK consumer energy prices went up by 5% on Monday, I anticipate that the cost of electricity will start to fall as more renewable power sources come online. The newly-operational Viking Link Interconnector means that we can trade electricity with Denmark, and the biggest wind farm in Scotland is now online.

That being said, there’s an imbalance in the UK as most wind power is generated in the north of England and Scotland, but the highest demand is in the south of England. And our energy grid doesn’t have capacity to move this, which means that some northern wind turbines have to be turned off and gas-fired power stations turned on – costing money and contributing to climate change. However, there’s been a big up-tick in home solar installations like ours which may help, albeit on a small scale.

The UK will do okay at Eurovision this year

In 2023, the Eurovision song contest was hosted in Liverpool. The 2022 winners Ukraine couldn’t host it safely due to the ongoing war, and the UK came second – our best result for over 20 years. And then despite what I thought was a good song from Mae Muller, we came second-from-bottom.

For 2024, Olly Alexander is representing the UK. As lead singer of Years & Years, I have some high expectations. I doubt we’ll win, but I would disappointed if we’re not mid-table. Of course, we haven’t actually heard the song yet.

Trump won’t win the US Presidential Election

Trump will almost certainly become the Republican Party’s candidate for president, but with two states banning him from their ballots, his campaign isn’t going well. I know Biden isn’t terribly popular, and wish he had stepped aside for someone younger like Kamala Harris, but Trump has made it pretty clear that if he wins (and manages to get a decent Republican Senate and House majority) then he will take the US down a path of authoritarianism that will take a lot of time to unpick. And whilst millions of Americans seem to be okay with this, I doubt it’s the majority.

We also don’t yet know what impact Trump’s legal issues will have, or whether the Federal Supreme Court will overrule Colorado and Maine’s bans. I didn’t think Trump would get elected in 2016, and so I have been wrong about this before, but I hope people’s experiences of 2017-2021 will guide them to vote against him again.

So these are my predictions for 2024. We’ll see at the end of the year whether they happen or not. Meanwhile, have a look at some other predictions from Terence Eden and Diamond Geezer.

When Jeremy Corbyn came to Bradford

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Yesterday, the Labour Party launched its General Election manifesto. And it chose to do so in the building where I work.

We were treated to Jeremy Corbyn and his shadow cabinet, who delivered a presentation and answered questions for around 90 minutes. All in front of the nation’s media, with live TV and internet broadcasts. Naturally, security was tight, and access was limited. Only university staff and students, Labour Party members, and invited members of the media where permitted. This included heavyweight political correspondents such as ITV’s Robert Peston, the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg and Sky’s Adam Boulton.

I was unable to get a seat, so I had to watch from one of the balconies above with no view of the stage. Corbyn got a really warm reception, particularly as the majority of people there were university staff. The biggest cheers were in response to Labour’s policies regarding ending hospital car parking charges, renationalising the railways, and, predictably, ending university tuition fees.

From the university’s perspective, it was great to see a high profile event run so well. This was despite it having been planned at such short notice. But we have form here: seven years ago, then Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown came to us to make a speech the day before the 2010 General Election. And the university’s first chancellor, back in 1966, was Labour prime minister Harold Wilson; this was something that Corbyn referenced in his speech.

I’m a Labour Party member, so I’ll be voting for Labour next month anyway. Brexit aside, I was very impressed with what Jeremy Corbyn promised us yesterday if elected. Sadly, that’s a big ‘if’; despite recent improvements, Labour are still trailing significantly in the polls. We’ll see what happens come June 9th, when the results will be clear.

All of the above is my own opinion, and not necessarily that of my employer.

PPE – the degree that runs Britain

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A photo of George Osborne, a PPE graduate, wearing PPE in a factory

If I mentioned the abbreviation ‘PPE’, you may think that I’m talking about ‘personal protective equipment’ – equipment that you wear when working in environments with potential health and safety risks.

But PPE can also mean ‘Philosophy, Politics and Economics‘, and specifically a Bachelor of Arts degree at the University of Oxford. Oxford’s PPE course is notable because a significant number of British politicians, journalists and experts studied the course. Prospective students see it as a major stepping stone into a career in politics.

Last month, The Guardian’s Long Read featured PPE. It starts by naming many of its alumni, which included the then leaders of Britain’s two largest political parties along with MPs from others. The course has strong heritage, having run at Oxford for almost 100 years, and with a glittering list of well-known graduates. As well as British politicians, it has attracted those from other countries and former US president Bill Clinton, former Pakistani president Benazir Bhutto, and Burmese political campaigner Aung San Suu Kyi are among its many international graduates.

Getting into the course, like any degree at the universities of Oxford and Cambridge, is an achievement in itself. (Note: I work in admissions at a rival UK university). Applicants are expected to achieve at least three straight A grades in their A-levels, though this can be from any three subjects and doesn’t need to include Philosophy, Economics or Politics. There’s also an admissions test called the Thinking Skills Assessment, and an interview, so academic ability alone is not enough to get admitted.

With so many of our politicians having graduated from a single course at a single university – and one that is attended by a large proportion of privately-educated students – it’s easy to see why there are accusations that Britain is ruled by an ‘elite’. I agree that it attracts those who plan to be career politicians, although I’m conflicted about whether that’s necessarily a bad thing. Certainly, you have to be intelligent and articulate to pass an interview and get a place on the course. Michael Gove claimed last year that we’ve had enough of experts; Gove is not a PPE graduate but studied English at Oxford. But personally, I’d rather have experts running the country, in the same way that you wouldn’t want your mate Dave from down the pub performing your keyhole surgery. Unless Dave was a qualified surgeon.

Which brings me to the point I’m trying to make. PPE at Oxford has become a de facto qualification for a high-level political qualification in Britain. We don’t have a kind-of ‘General Political Council’ to regulate politicians and ensure that our MPs and councillors are sufficiently qualified to stand for office. Nor do we have a ‘Chartered Institute’ that accredits degree courses. Whether we should is another matter – there have been many perfectly good MPs who are not career politicians, and who have switched to politics following careers in other industries. But it’s an interesting idea, and perhaps the reason why there are so many successful politicians who are PPE graduates, is because it’s such a good preparation for a political career.

Finally, you may enjoy the PPE in PPE Twitter account, which combines both definitions and shows PPE graduates posing for photographs whilst wearing PPE.

Oh, America

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Like most of the world, I was rather shocked when I read the news on Wednesday morning, following the US presidential election. I didn’t want to write about it straight-away and give myself time to process it, but I’m still flabbergasted that someone as awful as Donald Trump could be elected to be the most powerful person in the world.

I’m not going to try to come up with my own theories about why it happened – I’ll leave that to those with more knowledge of the facts. Especially as I don’t live in America, nor have I ever visited. But it brings back some painful memories of earlier this year, when it was announced that a relatively narrow majority of those who voted in the EU referendum voted to leave. And it reminds me of 2004, when George W Bush was re-elected US president with a greater share of the vote.

I don’t have any solutions, but America and the world have been in bad places before, and we’re still here. There’s an analogy I’ve heard where everyone is on a plane with an incompetent pilot; if he/she crashes then we all die so we need to work together to make sure we stay in the air. Whatever happens, the next four years have become very uncertain.

And I appreciate that as a white, able-bodied, straight middle-class male who doesn’t even live in America, it’s easy for me to say that. If I wasn’t at least one of those things, then I would rightly have more reason to be terrified. We need to stick together and be good allies to each other, and hope that we will all get through this alive.