@James57 Oh, yes, I appreciate that as some of my friends live in rural areas. There are huge numbers of people in similar situations, but politicians and campaigners can't seem to grasp that.

@ArishMell don’t forget to include the fact that the civil service has not had a pay rise in ten years and how that affected the value of thier pensions

@ArishMell I'm guessing you worked for Royal mail?. I think it was..Brown at the time? under labour and it yes it was sold off for a ridiculously low price. Or tbh it could have been Cameron at that time, I forget as the conservatives have been in power for what seems like a long time now.

@Ryannnnnn No, I dodn't work for Royal Mail and I am glad I did not! There was series on the radio a few months ago about the whole scandal.

RM had bought a new IT system called 'Horizon' from some Japanese firm, Hitachi I think, to run its Post Office branch finances. Unfortunetely it was just not fit for purpose and kept showing apparent losses of money - some due to the manufacturer's attempts to put it right. Its staff could read the finances directly and when they altered figures to test the programme, they did not or could not correct their changes.

No money was really missing, but rather than have the guts to admit it had bought rubbish and given the firm a month to correct the software errors or no more work and no more money to it, RM's directors decided to blame the sub-posters/mistresses and started to had have them prosecuted for theft.

Some were reimbursing the Post Office with their own money - where has that money gone? Why were the non-thefts and the attempted repayments not detected in audits?

They tried to keep it secret, to make it look like isolated rogue staff; but it was not long before everyone began to realise there was something odd about the apparent rise in branch thefts. Yet the Directors, even the so-called CEOs involved (two successive ones if I recall aright), and the software company stayed cowards and liars to the end. They still tried to claim Horizon was faultless; and resisted all attempts to have it, the finances and their claims investigated properly.

To them, and to the incompetent IT supplier who has escaped all action against it, ruining innocent people's lives and livelihoods was nothing. Many were sent to prison as result of the RM's perversion of the course of justice - none of the perjurers have been brougght to justice.

Simnce then, and indeed quite recently, the Courts have quashed the wrongful convictions but as the sole shareholder the Government (i.e. everyone via taxes) has to find the money to compensate them. It has admitted that RM itself could not afford it, and the cowards who ran RM or sold the software certainly would not even if you confiscate all their assets.

Too late for one or two victims, driven to suicide.

You might wonder why the post-masters' union failed them. It had basically been paid off by RM.

''''
Blair and Brown had wanted to give the Post Office to the Dutch delivery company, TNT! Well, we all know now that courier companies are not set up for domestic deliveries; and are often incompetent or inconvenient at it.

@ArishMell This.👍

@ArishMell Actually we would need a small fraction of the vehicles.Our cars spend most of their time parked up doing nothing.Autonomous taxis will be in continuous use so far more efficient.The cost would be spread across all who use the taxis instead of vehicle owners having to pay the entire cost themselves.Also taxis are a business with tax deductible expenses.

@tallpowerhouseblonde I see what you mean. I think that might work for fairly short, local journeys such as commuting but much less practical for longer trips extending over some days and to places where there is little or no other forms of public transport to provide a viable local alternative.


As a business of course, the taxis will not be cheap, adding up to substantial sums for those needing them daily.

I think that basically, many people are going to be confined to their localities, with only occasional forays for holidays or to visit relatives a long way away by bus or train - and where possible.

Huge swathes of the country's social and cultural life will disappear, too.

@ArishMell Using a taxi daily can be cheaper than car ownership right now.
Culture was around long before cars and will be here still when cars are long gone.
Long distance forays are already occasional and holiday destinations are regularly flown to the car stays at home,parked up still costing money to go rusty.

@ArishMell Oh & I thought it was such a good idea lol

@ArishMell Also, the average person today knows nothing about handling horses.

@chrisCA I can just imagine the driving-test.... "When I clap my hands I want you to do an emergency stop in full control".

@Rhode57 Unless things change, so far at least, "all electric" refers only to sales of new i.c.-engine cars from 2030.

The rest though, I agree totally. It has not been thought out at all. Ask most green campaigners and politicians the difference between power and energy and what is impossible about the latter, and they'd most likely be unable to do anything but gawp at you gone-out.

I won't have a car-charger in my home. No point. Apart from never going to be able to afford a battery-powered car, I am in the roughly half of the UK's motorists who have no parking space on own property. If I am lucky I can park in the street by my front gate, usually in the week when most of my neighbours are away at work.

I misread the post apparently. ..

@Notanymore Not your fault you actually read the post correctly.The post has it wrong.I replied to this post with how the future of personal transport will most likely be.

@tallpowerhouseblonde understood

Oh do I know it when I was a kid I would walk for miles with me dog now I struggle walking upstairs @Rhode57

@Havesomefun2 I am in the same boat hate it .I was a removal man lorry driver , how I miss work .

@Rhode57 Fedex me

@redredred Most car owners emphasize that it's not their personal choice; they say they must have a car because (... reason...).

@redredred No-one is talking of "outlawing" private cars! It will probaly become too expensive for many of us to own one, but not illegal!

@Rhode57 I agree - though would point out two possible reasons for such needless uses of the car, and those would be difficult to solve.

One is that the supermarket trade was built on encouraging car use only, and before on-line shopping started to hurt them, they went about hollowing out town-centres to their own advantage. To be fair many will now deliver, and run entirely mail-order services - though I don't know to what extent this narrows your choices still further.

The other - the school runs - may reflect a fear, real or not, that the streets are just too dangerous for unaccompanied children; but working parents may not have the time to walk their offspring to school then return home and drive to work. Genuinely not have time I mean, not through their own bad domestic planning.

Why are they driving to work as well? Perhaps because, as happened with my employer when it was forced to move to a rural location, their work site is remote from public transport.

@ArishMell I agree , however if all those who didnt need to stopped using their cars which I guarantee is over 75 percent then it wouldnt be dangerous and they could all walk with their friends who would also be walking

@Elessar those people are headaches personified lol

@deadgerbil Seriously, the "we don't live in fear" folk

@SW-User I think it can only be done gradually, starting in bigger cities where cars are already seen as a nightmare, by many.