Rusty Nails
Country Member
YTSAndy is certainly knocking them out tonight.
Both hands working overtime.
Both hands working overtime.
YTSAndy is certainly knocking them out tonight.
Both hands working overtime.
Could you give me an example of good contract design and regulation? Throw in delivery timescale for good measure? Please?
None that is perfect, of course, but I notice that we don't experience power cuts as we used to, our local train company provides, ime, cleaner more reliable, and more customer friendly services than BR ever did, and our rubbish collection (private provider) is reliable and efficient.
Compared with the monolithic, investment starved, poorly managed services I remember from the 1970s that feels like progress.
All personal, and anecdotal. 70s strikes aside, I get as many power cuts as I ever did, trains are so unreliable that I stopped using them, and the rubbish collection while reliable is less and less frequent. That is my personal anecdotal experience. I don't feel much progress from the 80s.
To be fair the less frequent refuse collection is a deliberate environmental policy to encourage recycling. 1980s refuse collection was putting as many bins or bags of unsorted waste out for collection and dumping in landfill (other than maybe some newspaper recycling, Oxfam taking silver foil and your glass bottles going for re-use).
There was a fascinating programme (BBC, I think) called 'The Secret Life of Rubbish', which documented the ballooning of rubbish from the 1950s onwards, when the 'easy disposal' of rubbish (and no thought about the consequences) let to the ballooning of how much stuff people threw away. Up till that point, 'dustbins' were mostly just for dust and ashes from open fires; food was barely wasted (I'm reminded of Mum putting literally a couple of spoonfuls of left-over baked beans or peas in a Tupperware to save to put in a stew or something another day), clothes and linen was repaired (eurgh, darned socks and sheets stiched back together), and most furniture & appliances lasted decades. Kitchens and bathrooms weren't replaced for decades.
I'm definitely not saying that was better (see 'darned socks'), but now we seem (rightly) to be pushing back a teensy weensy bit on profligate waste.
YTSAndy is certainly knocking them out tonight.
Both hands working overtime.
There was a fascinating programme (BBC, I think) called 'The Secret Life of Rubbish', which documented the ballooning of rubbish from the 1950s onwards, when the 'easy disposal' of rubbish (and no thought about the consequences) let to the ballooning of how much stuff people threw away. Up till that point, 'dustbins' were mostly just for dust and ashes from open fires; food was barely wasted (I'm reminded of Mum putting literally a couple of spoonfuls of left-over baked beans or peas in a Tupperware to save to put in a stew or something another day), clothes and linen was repaired (eurgh, darned socks and sheets stiched back together), and most furniture & appliances lasted decades. Kitchens and bathrooms weren't replaced for decades.
I'm definitely not saying that was better (see 'darned socks'), but now we seem (rightly) to be pushing back a teensy weensy bit on profligate waste.
To be fair the less frequent refuse collection is a deliberate environmental policy to encourage recycling.
Steady on Brian, you are making me come on all nostalgic for my 1950s childhood 😂
Back then, in the unusual even of a full dustbin, it was solved when you next emptied the hot ashes out of the fire, and set the bin alight. Ah happy days 😂
I have noticed a further change to recyclable paper boxes. Maybe one day they will rediscover paper bags.Notice how the mushroom punnets are now mostly HPDE often (same as milk bottle plastic and recyclable unlike the hard clear plastic). We need to standardise plastic for food through legislation so that we don't have such a disparity of recyclable and unrecyclable materials.
I have noticed a further change to recyclable paper boxes. Maybe one day they will rediscover paper bags.
It's not a clear-cut thing about paper bags, in environmental terms, once you take things such as transportation costs and water usage into account.