Brexit.

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

The Bank of England alone openly claims on their web site to host over 400.000 bars of gold, which is worth over 200 billion pound.

 

[Sid]

The Bank of England alone openly claims on their web site to host over 400.000 bars of gold, which is worth over 200 billion pound.

But I don't see a bank robbery for that gold stash. Way to heavy to transport.

 

[Chalice Yao]

This goes even further.
Why perform an actual bank robbery at all in this day and age, when the vast majority of money actually only exists as bits and bytes?
And by vast majority i mean over 90% worldwide only exists in digital form. which is....in retrospect, a bit scary.

 

[Govi]

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Are there still banks that have cash at the offices in the UK?
Here you have to go to an ATM if you want cash and they are mostly situated inside supermarkets and shopping malls these days.
At my bank you can get mortgages, loans, insurances, advise about stock market investments, but no cash available.

What do you do if you need to pay in cash at your bank?

Probably you personally never need to -- I don't -- but people here still sometimes pay cash in shops, cafes and bars for smaller purchases and, more frequently, in taxis other than uber, which must need banking.

 

[Sid]

They come and collect the cash at your shop/office with a money transporter.
You can get some sort of safe/strong box in your office or store, the moment you feed money into the machine, it is automatically accounted for on your bank account and it is no longer your responsibility. The bank or money transporter decides how often they empty that device.
Of course this is not a free service, but the number of robberies on small stores, gas stations and night stores has declined significantly over the years.
And some banks still offer central deposit facilities at well secured places, most of the times not the bank offices itself.

Only real problems are the ATM's at the outside of buildings.
The burglars simply drive a car trough the facade or place a small bomb against the ATM to get to the cash.
More and more ATM's are re positioned deeper inside large stores and malls.

99% of what I pay is done with my bank card. I have a few bank notes in my wallet for just in case, but I haven't used an ATM since October last year.

 

[Veritable Quandry]

Which is why the largest robberies in the US are usually armored cars. That's where the most money is exposed.

 

[Free]

Which is why the largest robberies in the US are usually armored cats.

"But that's why I wear the armor?!?!"

 

[danielravennest]

They got it though somewhat wrong: today you would not plunder a church, but some bank in the City of London instead.

There is literally tons of gold in the basement of the Bank of England:

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

But I don't see a bank robbery for that gold stash. Way to heavy to transport.

You are thinking too traditional, Sid. One method would be to imitate Goldfinger and just to pollute the gold. Or if the Norwegian guy from the comic would want to plunder the City of London would still be the place to go, but he would not try to steal gold, but to get access at one of the servers doing high speed trading at the London Stock Exchange and try to divert some transactions somewhere he's got access to.

 

[Kara Spengler]

BoJo finally has revealed his glorious plan to ram the UK's economy even further into the ground, because Brexit alone is just not bad enough to ruin the country!

Behold the new plan on how to regulate immigration on a point based system; to get a work permit you need minimum 70 points:

The industry, fish industry, health and service sector already are fearing the worst. The government though is of the opinion that those sectors should purify themselves from cheap migrant labour.

Some mention worthy laudation for this plan are:

Industry leaders warned the changes would have a huge impact on food processing factories that rely heavily on EU workers to keep the supermarket shelves full with pre-packed chicken, beef and pork cuts.

Tom Hadley, director of policy at the Recruitment and Employment Confederation, said: “Jobs the government considers ‘low-skilled’ are vital to wellbeing and business growth. The announcement threatens to shut out the people we need to provide services the public rely on.

“We need access to workers that can help us look after the elderly, build homes and keep the economy strong.”

UKHospitality chief executive, Kate Nicholls, said “ruling out a temporary, low-skilled route for migration in just 10 months’ time would be disastrous for the hospitality sector and the British people” and deter investment in the high street.

The Confederation of British Industry director general Carolyn Fairbairn said the removal of the cap on the number of skilled workers was “welcome”, but she warned that in “some sectors, firms would be left wondering how they would recruit the people needed to run their businesses.
“With already low unemployment, firms in care, construction, hospitality, food and drink could be most affected,” she said.

The hospitality sector will also be hit with no “barista visa” for coffee shops, despite warnings from Pret A Manger two years ago that only one in 50 job applicants were British.

Also vulnerable are hotels that rely on EU workers for cleaning, kitchen and chambermaid staff, and big business and homes who rely on EU workers for cleaning, security and housekeeping.

“If it comes to a point where it is harder to access labour then don’t turn off the tap overnight. Give people time to adjust. Please make the system cheaper – it is just ridiculously expensive,” said Ian Robinson, a partner at the firm and a former policy official at the Home Office.

But with its 80-strong majority, the government can deliver on its new policy with a immigration bill expected to ease through parliament in the coming months.

“UK businesses will need to adapt and adjust to the end of free movement, and we will not seek to recreate the outcomes from free movement within the points-based system,” said the government in a briefing paper.

It also said that employers would have to work harder to recruit and retain British staff.

“It is important that employers move away from a reliance on the UK’s immigration system and as alternative to investment in staff retention, productivity, and wider investment in technology and automation,” the briefing paper added.

Special arrangements are being made for seasonal workers who harvest the fields but this is only set at 10,000 places, far below the National Farmers’ Union’s (NFU) demands for temporary visas for 70,000 in 2021.

UK to close door to non-English speakers and unskilled workers

Government plans to take ‘full control’ of borders a disaster for economy and jobs, say industry leaders and Labour

www.theguardian.com

A points based immigration system. Those have a ton of problems.

Especially the things listed. Many jobs are happy with a bs or ms, but will not even require those if you are good at the job. Plus a lot of the most in demand jobs are unskilled anyway. Or between there and a doctorate. I guess they plan on staffing the nhs with all doctors but no nurses.

 

[Kara Spengler]

On the subject of Boris and bridges: let's remember that he couldn't even build a 360m long bridge across the River Thames.

An absurd vanity project for our age – Boris Johnson’s garden bridge | Rowan Moore

This scandalously mismanaged ‘gift to the people of London’ will cost the taxpayer £43m. For nothing

www.theguardian.com

So at most, you'll get a zip line across the Irish Strait out of this endeavour.

He did create some fun pics though.

 

[Kara Spengler]

It's genetic - Scandinavia and the World

Webcomic: It's just something that has to be done.

satwcomic.com

My ancestors came from Finland, Denmark, and the british isles [a bit of a debate if it was Ireland or England though].

I sometimes amuse myself that at some point in history one group of them got together with another group of them (Finns joined in on going a viking too at times) and sailed off to beat up a third bunch.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Brexit: EU and US trade deals 'at risk' if UK reneges on Northern Ireland pledges

Concerns raised after reports negotiating team told to devise plans to ‘get around’ protocol in withdrawal agreement

www.theguardian.com

 

[Sid]

Brexit: EU and US trade deals 'at risk' if UK reneges on Northern Ireland pledges

Concerns raised after reports negotiating team told to devise plans to ‘get around’ protocol in withdrawal agreement

www.theguardian.com

Downing street makes good Brexit deals so easy....

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

Speaking about good deals: the new British passports are being printed in Poland by Thales group and then exported to the UK. The UK had to run an open procurement for it under EU rules, and British competitor De La Rue was too expensive. So the Dutch-Polish Thales group landed the 11 years contract.

UK post-Brexit blue passports made in Polish factory

Britain’s new post-Brexit blue passports will be given to applicants from next month, the Home Office announced yesterday. What it did not say, however, was that they will be made by a Franco/Dutch company at a factory in Poland, under EU procurement rules. In one of the ironies of Brexit, the 1

www.thetimes.co.uk

 

[Stora]

PM gives green light to post-Brexit EU research deal

The UK will endeavour to continue within a €100bn (£85bn) EU science programme after Brexit.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson gave the green light for the UK to negotiate its continued participation within the Horizon Europe research programme.
Horizon Europe provides funding to scientists, students and industry for research.
The news was revealed within a document setting out the government's approach to negotiations with the EU.
The statement will come as a relief to research leaders, who feared that research collaboration would become a bargaining chip in general trade negotiations.

PM gives green light to post-Brexit research deal

 

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

PM gives green light to post-Brexit EU research deal




PM gives green light to post-Brexit research deal

He’s had so enough of experts he's shipping them off to the continent.

- -

 

[Caliandris]

This goes even further.
Why perform an actual bank robbery at all in this day and age, when the vast majority of money actually only exists as bits and bytes?
And by vast majority i mean over 90% worldwide only exists in digital form. which is....in retrospect, a bit scary.

What shocks me is how little of online/cyber crime is actually included in the crime figures. Unless things have changed recently, none of it is included in the crime figures for the UK. I don't know whether anyone has a handle on the true scale of the crime wave hitting people through bogus products or websites or phone calls purporting to be their banks.

Given how much would be raised by the Robin Hood tax (0.05% tax on banking/share transactions is the idea), in one week, enough for one million ambulance calls, for example, the clever crook is probably working out ways to make micro charges to a lot of people rather than conning a few people out of their life savings. Who would notice 50p disappearing?

 

[Kara Spengler]

Speaking about good deals: the new British passports are being printed in Poland by Thales group and then exported to the UK. The UK had to run an open procurement for it under EU rules, and British competitor De La Rue was too expensive. So the Dutch-Polish Thales group landed the 11 years contract.

UK post-Brexit blue passports made in Polish factory

Britain’s new post-Brexit blue passports will be given to applicants from next month, the Home Office announced yesterday. What it did not say, however, was that they will be made by a Franco/Dutch company at a factory in Poland, under EU procurement rules. In one of the ironies of Brexit, the 1

www.thetimes.co.uk

The part I like best is that there is no EU law about colours of passports in the first place.