ECCOnoob

Not necessarilly. There are always those cyclists who fall off and smash their head into the ground, wizz through a red light and get run over by a truck, randomly bounce upon to the pavements or cut through a precinct and come flying off when trying to avoid a load of pedestrians or catch hypothermia when they are rain soaked or blowing about in a gale whilst they're wobbling along on their daily commute. There's a history of fit and healthy joggers who have dropped dead with heart attacks. There are gym monkeys who go pounding the weights several times a week and end up with back strains, degenerative joint problems. On the other hand, there are fortunate people who smoke like a chimney and drink all their lives who managed to get to 90 plus. There are others who don't know the meaning of the word salad and survive on nothing more than roast beef, Gregg's sausage rolls and curlywurlies and end up getting a telegram form the monarch. Now I am not saying that a healthy lifestyle is a bad thing. I am not saying that we don't need to be mindful of our diets and get out there and do a bit of exercise once in a while. But I do think that a vast majority of life expectancy is down ones genes and own family legacy of life expectancy. Self-preservation only goes so far.

Out of interest, when was the last time you called them out on doing a good thing?

Oh please, It's hardly supposed to be competing with the London eye, is it. It's a fairground attraction that's here for a few weeks and will mainly be used by young kids and their parents who are more interested in the ride rather than some photogenic life-changing view. When it was located at the top of fargate the view was hardly some glorious aspect. They will have good reason why it is in the position. It is. These things aren't done on a whim. Maybe it's mountings have to be in a certain position which are only feasible in that direction. Maybe there is access issues with side roads or utility corridors or man holes which had to be kept clear. Either way, does it really matter. It's creating a bit of life and footfall to the area. Something a bit of a novelty for people to visit up to Christmas. I seriously think some people just take delight in putting everything down at all times no matter what the council does.

Actually they paid £648 million for it in direct taxes Also don't their thousands of staff pay taxes on their wages and are provided with huge numbers of paid employment roles which in turn also contributes to their own spending across our society and businesses. Don't their warehousing and property and land developers and contractors and builders and traders and equipment manufacturing and supply business earn money from Amazon for all their businesses, in turn, creating thousands more jobs and paid employees in other industries all contributing to our tax system. What about all the taxes and utilities and resources they have to pay for their vast fleet of vehicles and physical buildings. Isn't that a big contributor to our economy. What about their expenditure for our banking and insurance services and legal services and consultancy which all is required to run their vast businesses in the UK. Isn't that further contribution? Like I said. It's not so black and white. They are paying the amount of tax that they are legally obliged to pay. Don't like it. Campaign to change the tax laws.

That is a very true statement. In my opinion there is never enough actually doing that though. Take take take without enough people putting in. Far too many expecting things handed to them on a plate. For too many, taking things for granted, wasting resources and expecting others to pick up the pieces for their own irresponsible choices.

Despite your hysterical doom-mongering (again). We are still the six largest GDP in the world. We are in the top five for global health care. Three of our universities are named within the top 10 global index London is still number two in the global finance centres index just behind New York. We remain 10th in the world tourism rankings with nearly 40 million people visiting us on last count. We have world leader credentials for our contributions to biomedical research. Our aerospace research and industry is reported to be the second or third largest in the world. We are ranked 5th on global innovation index. We remain 7th on the world economic forum. We were audited as second only to the US in terms of our geopolitical, diplomatic leverage and national strength. We remain members of the G7, ECHR, NATO, UN Security Council and COP. Our unemployment rate is bordering the top 20 lowest in the world rankings and our minimum hourly wage rate is in the top 10 highest world rankings. …… Add on the fact that, according to the news, we must be doing something right considering we have boat loads of people desperately trying to get on to our shores everyday. Now for once, why don't you try to do a bit of positive thinking. Try looking beyond your back door at some of the real world out there. Try not taking every slight inconvenience, downturn, disruption or closure are some overdramatic hysterical confirmation of the end of the world. Yes we are far from perfect. Yes, we are facing a rocky patch ahead of us. Yes there is some impact on the economy and the cost of living Yes there is inbalance between the very rich and the very poor. But, it is nothing that people in countries all over the world and not facing and haven't faced before. Stop being so deluded to think there's going to be some perfect utopia where everyone is equal and there is some declaration of fair share across the planet. Stop taking every single headline at face value that automatically gets translated to blah blah Tory's bad blah blah rich people blah blah Thatcher to blame. If councils are going bankrupt when they are cross party there is far far more to be questioned. How was the money being managed? where has it gone? is there allegations of mismanagement? is there allegations of wastage? Is there investment failures? Are there areas that can be cut or unnecessary or duplicated elsewhere? It's not so black and white. To laughingly declare our country as some Banana Republic is complete nonsense.

Didn't mind using their health care though did you? Quite happy to do that so couldn't have been too worried about their crumbling, woke, socialist, failing infrastructure. How's the public healthcare system in the Dominican? Beyond perfection I assume. You seem to purport everything else there is.

Thanks. That's very interesting. So even the Guardian who presented in February a balanced comment about clear other factors at play has sat back and allowed it's sister paper to push the the shortened, more hyped inconclusive narrative nine months later. ...and people bang on about how it's just the Murdoch papers who sensationalise and distort. I wonder which version of the the story the point scoring opposition MPs and talking heads will use when they try and do a bit of finger pointing.

Says who? That is a whole point of this discussion. It is not so simplistic as the headline makes out - but clearly it's done it's job by getting the emotive reaction from people like you. People are getting paid the wage that THEY contractually agreed to receive for their services.They are not doing it out the goodness of their hearts. If people believe they deserve more, than they need to demonstrate that and argue it with their employer for a raise. They are free to terminate service with one employer and go off and find something better and more highly paid elsewhere with a different employer. The market will soon dictate what capacity and scope someone's value is, as it has been for decades before.

I would argue very similar for the legal profession too. To me its far more the type of firm you join, prestige of the work and nature of the practice which dictates levels of salary. Internally, it is irrelevant whether someone is born in a council house or a mansion. If they are doing the same level of work in the same level of department, that will be the catalyst for their pay grade. Nearly all legal firms from tiny high street practices to big corporate magic circle firms ask for ideally a 2:1 degree. Class certainly never comes up any of the many interviews I have had over the years and I've gone from comprehensive school, self-funded university, low-level legal aid practice to massive corporate firm in my career. I've had to work hard to get it and of course being faced with those who wrongly assumed they could simply breeze in from private school and red brick universities. But I've still been on the bill and still being able to show and prove I can do the job. Maybe, if it was actually looked into much deeper, there are other factors at play than simply class. Sticking with my world of legal, perhaps it's feasible that someone raised of modest means in a council house in Grimsby qualifying in law will more naturally end up working for a smaller local or regional practice earning a lower salary against someone bought up in a middle class house in Surrey who went to a southeastern university and happens to geographically end up working for a large corporate firm in the centre of London. Similar, someone who doesn't like to leave their familiar surroundings of say the middle of Wales Valleys may and up working at a smaller practice and earning less than someone born and raised in Leeds who gets to work in a more prestige firm in the big city. Perhaps there might be mature people who have done a career change, starting off working in some industry which then closed and they've retrained and re skilled and joined the legal world in their late 30s or 40s. Obviously then, they are naturally going to be behind others who have been post qualified for many years ahead of them despite the fact doing the same job. Every workforce has annual increments and salary differentials based on years of service. The point is, none of that could be directly deemed to be as a result of their 'class' holding them back The article seems very light on detailed reasons for such discrepancies. As we all know, simply producing a load of stats and quotations and speculations is only one tiny part of the full story. Just like the whole of gender pay gap issue, it is far far more nuanced than most of these simplistic journalistic pieces make out.

I didn't know the ONS was known as fantasy land

I was referring to the word 'troll' because said person was one. A well known one who was thankfully kicked off the forum until they inevitably respawn under a different username. Yes there are increases in fraud activities but as I said in my other post, it is offset by the dramatic reduction in numbers of other types of crime particularly muggings, petty theft and burglary. What was once physical assets has moved into digital ones. I am not saying that no crime exists but let's not be so blase to think that a world of carrying round bags of cash was so wonderful either. I would argue that feelings about customer service is subjective. For some people, they believe that anything less than absolute personal service and a caring touch is all that matters. Some others may argue that speed, minimal interaction and improved convenience of 24-Hour 7 day accessibility is a price worth paying for having a more hands off self-service approach. Perhaps even more so if the net result of such is lower and lower prices which us consumers are demanding. Automation, centralisation, computerisation and globalisation have all being big contributors to the bountiful amount of products and services that people could have only dreamed of a few decades ago. Music and radio quality is again subjective. There is more freedom of choice now with far less influence on being told what someone has decided you can watch and listen to at a time when they dictate. For many, linear broadcasting is dead. We pick and choose our own schedules and own content all at the click of a button. As for news, don't make me laugh. Whilst there might be a deluge of information from 1001 sources online, let's not pretend that so-called traditional print media was any less filled with speculation, lies, sensationalism and spin. They were all at it since day one. There has always been some tribal war over which 'version' of the news one wants to believe usually influenced on which publication ones family predecessors, friends or neighbours did. At least with the internet and modern media there's the ability to obtain a range of opinion from a range of sources outside of one's own backyard. An ability to make an informed decision independently. Social media and online resources are just a tool. Not to be taken absolutely literally. We still have the ability to make our own decisions based on what we are presented with. We all have the ability to go and look at the other view. Something which would not have been possible even in recent history. Surely that's got to be an improvement. As for your comments about public transport, you seem to be suggesting that 'communication' only applies if it's face to face. Have you thought about perhaps all these 'lemmings staring at a screen' are doing far more communication with people they actually want to communicate with. They are engaged in text chats, WhatsApps, message postings, video calls, social media postings to their groups of friends and acquaintances. There may be communicating with work colleagues, responding to emails, preparing for the day ahead, making arrangements for meetings or appointments. They may be reading articles or postings or blogs from interest groups they are part of or communities engage with..... Like it or not, that's communication and in the modern world it strays far from just talking to people sat immediately beside you. The world is bigger than that.

..... Yes offset by the massive reduction in the number of in-person robberies. One has replaced the other. Doesn't support your delusions that some how hard currency is the better infallible safe option. If everyone regressed back to using cash all the time for everything what do you think would happen to the crime stats then?

Yeah yeah yeah because nobody ever had their wallets nicked did they? They never ever fell victim to giving away their money to fraudsters.. businesses never ever suffered any loss of their income through fake bank notes or or fraudulent currency did they? There were no such thing back in the glorious days like con artists, confidence tricksters or postal scams...right? Horse crap it's reducing freedoms. I can browse a range of products, choose from a range of prices and suppliers in countries all over the world. I can communicate at the click of a button almost for free with people all over the planet. I can have some face-to-face contact with family members whenever I feel like it despite them living thousands of miles away. I can have lively debates with strangers on a multitude of topics on forums just like this one. I can become engaged in media, entertainment, performance and arts from independent unknown performers throwing out their content on video platforms or social media. I can learn and research and become informed from a range of sources in different jurisdictions.....

Do calm down Anna. Firstly, go go back and read my post in context, it was a dramatic statement used as part of calling out a known troll on this forum. Secondly, I am not buying your often insulting assumption that somehow our elderly population are technophobe dinosaurs who can't 'cope' with the adaptions of the modern digital society. That is certainly not my experience as the vast majority of the 70 + I know are fully aware of how to use the online facilities of most businesses and embrace things like online banking and Amazon as much as someone in their 20s. Even the couple of 80 + year olds have the basic concepts of using a smartphone and also have the common sense to ask for help from a friend, neighbour, relative, or even the business themselves as to how to do something if they didn't know. The digital age is far from some new concept. The internet in people's homes has been commonplace for nearly 30 years. Mobile telephones first arrived on the scene over 35 years ago. The existence of some form of computer system has been present in most businesses for well over 40+ years. There is not a pensioner on the planet whose not had some form of exposure to the digital world and been touched by the silicon chip for at least the last third of their lives. As others have said, is it really not being able to cope with technology or unwillingness to choose to learn. The ability for people to rock up at some utility company showroom to pay bills has gone to automatic bank payments or digital transfers....They coped. Their pay packets stopped being handed out in little brown envelopes once a week in favour of monthly salary direct to their bank accounts...they coped. The days of queueing up in a stuffy bank taking out wads of cash over the counter was replaced by the ability to obtain your cash 24-hours a day from a cashpoint machine..... They coped. The changeover from writing out cheques to using plastic cards to pay for ones goods happened...they coped. The procedure of signing credit card chits and printed receipts changed to use of chip and pin number systems... They coped. Paper travel passes were replaced by contactless cards on board buses or automated ticket barriers.... They coped. The days of television with two channels swapped over using a knob on the tv set was evolved into 4 channels changed over by the magic of a remote control and evolved again into hundreds of channels changed over using electronic program guides and scroll lists ....they coped. Music was listened to through LPs twirling around on record players to be replaced by cassette tapes and multi-level hi-fi systems to be replaced by the CD to be replaced by portable MP3 players and now played through ones television just by shouting at a voice activated black box in the corner of the room....they coped. Pensions and benefits changed from someone having to queue up at the post office counter into payments being made directly into to personal bank accounts....they coped. The days of trotting down to a travel agent to book once holiday have been replaced by browsing the internet, through digital brochures, reading TripAdvisor reviews and booking online.....they coped. The list goes on. I feel you are putting down your fellow pensioners with your dramatic and inaccurate assumptions. We all have the continual ability to adapt. Something which people of all ages have done throughout their lives. I think it's completely wrong to be stating that the digital age is somehow cold and faceless. Used right and fully embraced it can bring the world closer than we ever thought possible. It can keep those isolated connected in ways that would not have been feasible even 35 years ago. It can keep families together who may be split across the world at the click of a button. It can provide facilities to aid comfort, access and convenience to those who may be less mobile or even housebound.

Perhaps living in a big city isn't for you. Maybe you are more suited to some tiny village.

You can't be looking very hard or must be very selective in who you want cutting your hair because I can think of dozens of places that offer just the services you want - a large amount tagged as Turkish barbers or other named simple basic barber shops located all over suburbs. In fact, the types of luxury mens salons who spend 45+ minutes preening over someone are in the minority. Maybe you are looking in the wrong type of locations. Outside of the city centre particularly, there will be dozens and dozens of normal barber shops. However I don't quite understand what you mean by the term 'English' barber.

They really couldn't. Security problems would have been the least of the complexities. Lovely idea as it is, the council can't just take over 2 floors of a building. Somebody owns that building. How much would it have cost in rent for part or all of it for the duration? Who will be paying for the cost of the power, heating, lighting? Who will be paying for the cost of restoring the lifts and escalators and checking everything is safe and compliant ready for members of the general public to be accessing the floors after 20 + months of abandonment... Add on the fact that the building may not even be suitable for hosting such a Christmas market. You can't install chalets inside so how would stallholders present the items. How will things be segregated, how will the footfall work. How will preparation of food and drinks be undertaken without the relevant designated areas, installed equipment gas, waste and extraction facilities... That's before we get onto the the endless red tape regarding building permissions, safety regulations, insurance and change of use permits..... Rightly or wrongly, that is the unfortunate realities of anything like this. It really isn't that simple.

Oh really? Try retail workers. Try hospitality workers. Try drivers and couriers and warehouse operatives. What about maybe contractors and tradeies who have to spend several hours a day travelling to some site before they even start work. What about business owners and the self-employed, many of whom after spending all day running the shop floor then spend several hours in the evening running all the back office side. What about large numbers of those of working the White collar professions. They aren't on hourly rate. They rarely get overtime, but I can count on one hand the number I see who are in at 9 and gone by 5. More likely they are frequently spending time working extra hours on some client project, catching up with emails, attending last minute meetings, out-of-hours phone calls, urgent queries, spending time travelling around to businesses or sites or court before they start their working day...... The list goes on across all professions. Honestly the arrogance frequently shown by those in the public sector is astounding. To be so deluded to think that they are the only ones who have a hard-working life. The only ones who have things like outgoings for rent and food and utilities. To think they are the only ones who have little time to spend with their children because their work gets in the way. The vast majority of the people in the working world no matter what their position face the same. We all have bills. We all have expenses. We all have to pay for our travel. We all have to pay for our car parking. What the hell makes them so special? Jesus can we stop treating doctors and nurses like they are some angels sent from heaven, sacrificing to serve and protect out the goodness of their hearts. They are doing a bloody job. A job they signed up for and they are remunerated for at a contractually agreed rate they chose to accept. Maybe their wage is modest compared to what they 'feel' they deserve, but it's almost insulting at a time of recession that a £30k + or high £20k + salary is anything like poverty. If they seriously can't survive on that amount of money when millions of others are surviving on much less - they really need to take a good hard look at themselves Disgusting. As are their arrogant Union pot stirrers.

Yes, slowly. I'm not oblivious to the fact that we have progression which is slower compared to some other cities. However,I would strongly argue that a contributor to such sluggish progress is us having a large number of the population who embrace doing nothing more than harping on about the past, criticising, objecting and delaying anything that gets proposed. You only have to look at some of the whiny pathetic comments all over the SCC planning portal or the local rags or this very forum to see it in action. There is also a frequent stance taken by far too many people to be willing every single project, development or business to fail before it even gets a chance to get off the ground, just because they have chosen to take a dislike to it. Don't know about you, but I would consider that to be slightly off-putting to those developments and businesses who might want to invest here. Waaaa Waaaa why do we never get any nice shops. Why are we lumbered with all the cheap and stores and charity shops......... ... Whose gonna shop in Flannels, have you seen their ridiculous prices, they're just a poser shops filled with ten bob millionaires. Waaaa Waaaa why do we never get any nice bars and restaurants. It's not fair Leeds and Manchester get everything before us..... ...I don't like silly pretentious food, don't they realise there is a recession on, nobody pays that for meat and gravy. I could cook it cheaper at home. Waaaa Waaaa why is there never any development in our city. What are our incompetent council doing. Why does everything take so long to build. Why are we always still behind.......... ... Who wants to live there? Why is everything being turned into flats? Why can't they leave things as it was was. I don't like that new building it's ugly. The way some people carry on we're lucky to get anything. You are missing the point.

Nobody seemed to be doing all this bitching when a fake alpine shack got placed there several years in a row or the times when there was a huge metal and neon lit ferris wheel in its place or even back in the day when for decades the long-standing feature was an ugly litter filled concrete and metal fountain with some stinky pond around it. I'm sure it's arguable that none of those were in keeping with the the traditional buildings of the area but so what? That's what the majority of cities are like. They are constantly evolving. Constantly jumbling old and new side-by-side. As others have said, the area is not some absolute historic national importance location. I'm sure there's lots of other things that the rose-tinted mob keep going gooey eyed for, which were not necessarily in keeping with the traditional area but they still got built. The hole in the road certainly was far from in keeping but there's plenty harping on about its its glory days. Exactly the same with the monstrosity that was castle market and sheaf markets. The old peace gardens filled with decaying plants and dodgy characters hang around the monstrosity that was the egg box building. The traditionalists wailed about the changes back then just as much - but thank god the developers got their way and we can all agree we now have much nicer and modern looking area which has obviously attracted many businesses to locate themselves there. The same change is happening right now as we see empty ex retail buildings finally being slowly converted into alternative uses. Is all bringing new life and more importantly new blood to an area. Perhaps some people just need to realise that not everything that gets built is going to be for them. I think we all know there are far too many locals who don't like change.

Do they??? I doubt anyone under 40 knows it as that. Neither will the thousands of fresh face students coming into the city every year. Good grief us Sheffielders really love clinging on to long defunct names don't we. It's Cole Brothers all over again. Given the manpower services commission was disbanded by 1987, I would suggest that more people know it as simply Moorfoot or that big red building given the revolving door of government departments throughout the 90s and the council moving in as far back as 2011.

Good for them. I completely agree with them. I think it's about time that there was some disruptors in the world of funerals and less focus on people feeling they need to spend vast amounts of money and almost be compelled to 'put on a show' after their death. As someone who is totally non-religious and always had the mantra of ...once you're dead you're dead... , I'll be more than happy to simply be quickly cremated and that's it done. Body Disposal r Us. Simply toasted. End of days solutions. Whatever one wants to call it - it suits me. Memories of my late father remain in my head, from photographs, from objects, from locations. It's legacy through those mean far more than I will ever remember from some fancy funeral service or a load of blabbering from some minister. I'm sure I can't be alone in that.

^^^^^^ absolutely this. Was about to say something similar. I did find it very convenient timing when the award got announced, but when you read in to it, it's no wonder it won. Yes of course it has flawless service, short queues and less crowded facilities when it only deals with less than a third of the number of passengers of its nearest rival. Perhaps the survey should have asked said passengers when they would be prepared to pay three four times cost of the plane tickets in order to maintain such low numbers of footfall and thus such exquisite personalised service. Whatever award they give it, doesn't detract from the fact that over its tenure, the airport failed to attract a single big-name scheduled airline to operate any substantial and profitable services from it. The chance to grab a big budget carrier has gone, and it's nearest rivals can and are doing far better with far more established passenger numbers. Now can we just let this thing die with some dignity instead of prolonging the agony. Simply throwing money at it to keep it desperately propped up for another year is going to achieve nothing.

I would definitely agree with that. It does seem to be a half arsed approach which could be very easily fixed with very little money outlay. Firstly, its branding. I'm aware of the service, I've seen the buses travelling around even accidentally spotted a couple of its designated bus stops - but blink and you'll miss them. I can't understand why these buses were not liveried in some bold distinct colour, bright yellow? bright green? Bold logo? Cartoon design? Just something that gives them a distinct identity away from any other buses in town. That branding and colour scheme could then be very clearly identified on associated signage or stopping points which would help people identify exactly where the route runs and where they can board and alight. At least the old 'freebee' did that. Secondly, whilst I do not believe Sheffield is touristy enough to have any sort of bus tour, they could at least have use this type of service to give announcements and point out key attractions at each of it stopping points. All it would take is a basic audio announcement on a loop which I'm sure could greatly help when all the student freshers come to town and when there are are visitor events on. Hotels and venues could be directing people to the service particularly when they are travelling to and from the stations. Thirdly, I think they've missed a great opportunity for local targeted advertising which could have brought in some income and may even partly fund the service. It could have offered local businesses to be part of the announcements or even have some sort of digital displays showing various businesses/hotels as it approaches stopping points. I've seen such things on other services around the world and really can't be that difficult with 2022 technology. I'm not one for speculation usually but I do wonder if the local taxi mafia have had some persuasion in why the connect bus service offering is so lacklustre.