Simon Jeffrey
@simonjeffrey.bsky.social
Personal opinions about transport and devolution policy.
One thing I’d love to see from Reeves and Alexander in addition to pay-per-mile charging is figuring out a a way make it pay-per-lb too. Probably via VED for simplicity. Small, light EVs take up less space & allow tiny batteries to power decent ranges. Encourage them more.
youtu.be/owlQpKL14E4?...
youtu.be/owlQpKL14E4?...
New Renault Twingo: The Return Of Small Cheap Cars!
YouTube video by Everything Electric CARS
youtu.be
November 10, 2025 at 8:34 AM
One thing I’d love to see from Reeves and Alexander in addition to pay-per-mile charging is figuring out a a way make it pay-per-lb too. Probably via VED for simplicity. Small, light EVs take up less space & allow tiny batteries to power decent ranges. Encourage them more.
youtu.be/owlQpKL14E4?...
youtu.be/owlQpKL14E4?...
Reposted by Simon Jeffrey
It’s all just so pathetic. We need to add 2p to the higher rate and 4p to the basic rate and then unpick a bunch of the tiny demented tax incentives that crap like this has created and instead they are gonna do more of the crap and still get hung for breaking their promises. Incredible scenes.
Reeves should be aiming to get off two cycles: “every budget is an ordeal, every minor fluctuation in the forecast is a nightmare“ and “we did some small tax tweaks to raise £2bn and whoopsydaisy, something has fallen over unexpectedly/inflation is higher”.
I’m with Vince.
And 2p on income tax plus 2p off NICS to raise £6bn feels like being hung for half a lamb.
www.ft.com/content/9e56...
And 2p on income tax plus 2p off NICS to raise £6bn feels like being hung for half a lamb.
www.ft.com/content/9e56...
November 8, 2025 at 12:58 PM
It’s all just so pathetic. We need to add 2p to the higher rate and 4p to the basic rate and then unpick a bunch of the tiny demented tax incentives that crap like this has created and instead they are gonna do more of the crap and still get hung for breaking their promises. Incredible scenes.
Reposted by Simon Jeffrey
🎉 Camden's new plans for Holborn are mind-blowingly good: bit.ly/4qOtVMg
Major changes for Theobalds Rd, Southampton Row, Kingsway, High Holborn & further afield. New Oxford Street & Great Ormond Street plans look like big changes for better!
Kudos Cllr @adamdkharrison.bsky.social 👏
Major changes for Theobalds Rd, Southampton Row, Kingsway, High Holborn & further afield. New Oxford Street & Great Ormond Street plans look like big changes for better!
Kudos Cllr @adamdkharrison.bsky.social 👏
November 7, 2025 at 2:36 PM
🎉 Camden's new plans for Holborn are mind-blowingly good: bit.ly/4qOtVMg
Major changes for Theobalds Rd, Southampton Row, Kingsway, High Holborn & further afield. New Oxford Street & Great Ormond Street plans look like big changes for better!
Kudos Cllr @adamdkharrison.bsky.social 👏
Major changes for Theobalds Rd, Southampton Row, Kingsway, High Holborn & further afield. New Oxford Street & Great Ormond Street plans look like big changes for better!
Kudos Cllr @adamdkharrison.bsky.social 👏
London and Manchester to get NBA Europe teams. Brutal confirmation to Birmingham of second city status. Man City building the Co-Op arena next door to the Etihad looking pretty smart.
NBA targets 2027 launch for new Europe-based league with 16-team model
The NBA is targeting October 2027 for its new Europe-based league, with a 16-team model and talks underway across major cities, clubs and investors
www.theguardian.com
November 8, 2025 at 7:21 AM
London and Manchester to get NBA Europe teams. Brutal confirmation to Birmingham of second city status. Man City building the Co-Op arena next door to the Etihad looking pretty smart.
This video from CityEd on Manchester’s potential 3-cross city tunnels is fantastic. Not sure TfGM could do better. youtu.be/PADrgyTPpFs?...
Is Manchester finally getting an underground network?
YouTube video by CityEd.
youtu.be
November 7, 2025 at 9:31 PM
This video from CityEd on Manchester’s potential 3-cross city tunnels is fantastic. Not sure TfGM could do better. youtu.be/PADrgyTPpFs?...
Definitely don't hate the 3-unitary Kent proposal
November 7, 2025 at 4:01 PM
Definitely don't hate the 3-unitary Kent proposal
Congestion charge is rising from £15 to £18. EVs to go from 0% to 75% rate. So that’s £13.50 a day from an Uber and £5k a year if that vehicle was being driven every day. A helpful contribution.
Electric vehicles set to pay London Congestion Charge
Electric vehicles will no longer be exempt due to their rising numbers, Transport for London says.
www.bbc.co.uk
November 7, 2025 at 9:15 AM
Congestion charge is rising from £15 to £18. EVs to go from 0% to 75% rate. So that’s £13.50 a day from an Uber and £5k a year if that vehicle was being driven every day. A helpful contribution.
Reposted by Simon Jeffrey
The data continues piling up from non-sophisticated anecdotes, to sophisticated anecdotes (this one), right up to fleet telematics data that the battery management systems in EVs have solved battery degradation (at least to a level that keeps the vehicle on the road)...
6/7 Then I found a certificate in the emails. Battery is at 97% state of health at around 100.000km. (which is very good)
November 6, 2025 at 11:00 AM
The data continues piling up from non-sophisticated anecdotes, to sophisticated anecdotes (this one), right up to fleet telematics data that the battery management systems in EVs have solved battery degradation (at least to a level that keeps the vehicle on the road)...
Reposted by Simon Jeffrey
Fun dynamic of the budget is that the Tories did all the easy bits when it came to hosing the rich, leaving behind an unbelievably progressive income tax system www.economist.com/britain/2025...
November 6, 2025 at 11:03 AM
Fun dynamic of the budget is that the Tories did all the easy bits when it came to hosing the rich, leaving behind an unbelievably progressive income tax system www.economist.com/britain/2025...
If true, delighted Reeves is doing it this way. Surprised by the negative reaction seen on here. Keep it simple, stupid. Just read the odometer at your annual MOT, no risk of 'Big Brother wants to track you' stuff. Leave the management congestion to local transport authorities.
The battle over pay-per-mile road tax could destroy Keir Starmer's government – here's how Labour can avoid disaster (FREE TO READ!)
takes.jamesomalley.co.uk/p/pay-per-mi...
takes.jamesomalley.co.uk/p/pay-per-mi...
The battle over pay-per-mile road tax could destroy Keir Starmer's government – here's how Labour can avoid disaster
The new culture war to end all culture wars?
takes.jamesomalley.co.uk
November 6, 2025 at 11:12 AM
If true, delighted Reeves is doing it this way. Surprised by the negative reaction seen on here. Keep it simple, stupid. Just read the odometer at your annual MOT, no risk of 'Big Brother wants to track you' stuff. Leave the management congestion to local transport authorities.
Reposted by Simon Jeffrey
A withering critique of British energy policy by Dieter Helm.
"Britain is not going to have cheap energy any time soon – unless there is radical policy action."
dieterhelm.co.uk/energy-clima...
"Britain is not going to have cheap energy any time soon – unless there is radical policy action."
dieterhelm.co.uk/energy-clima...
British energy policy – not cheap, not home-grown and not secure - Dieter Helm
Some people – and some politicians – seem to believe that if you keep repeating claims eventually they will be believed, even as the evidence unfolds that they are obviously just not true. Any counter...
dieterhelm.co.uk
November 4, 2025 at 8:57 AM
A withering critique of British energy policy by Dieter Helm.
"Britain is not going to have cheap energy any time soon – unless there is radical policy action."
dieterhelm.co.uk/energy-clima...
"Britain is not going to have cheap energy any time soon – unless there is radical policy action."
dieterhelm.co.uk/energy-clima...
Tbf the worst of the beast starving tax cuts - the huge increase in the personal allowance - was a Lib Dem policy. The ironic awfulness of Osborne’s tax and benefit policies is that a sensible Tory party wishing to regain professionals and not just pensioners would look to undo his wheezes too.
Starmer should be a troll and tell everyone he’s reversing austerity, starting with all the stupid beast-starving tax cuts the Tories made between 2010 and 2024.
October 29, 2025 at 12:36 PM
Tbf the worst of the beast starving tax cuts - the huge increase in the personal allowance - was a Lib Dem policy. The ironic awfulness of Osborne’s tax and benefit policies is that a sensible Tory party wishing to regain professionals and not just pensioners would look to undo his wheezes too.
Reposted by Simon Jeffrey
Businesses have noticed this is a leftwing government. Farmers have noticed. The globally mobile rich have noticed. Basically the only people who don’t think this is a leftwing government are the people who want one.
October 29, 2025 at 11:11 AM
Businesses have noticed this is a leftwing government. Farmers have noticed. The globally mobile rich have noticed. Basically the only people who don’t think this is a leftwing government are the people who want one.
You can have robust public support to raise little while warping behaviour negatively to raise even less, or moderate support for a tax with robust income and minimal changes to overall behaviour(and those changes probably will be on the positive side). I’ll take broad but small and beneficial.
Indeed, opposition to taxing most affluent groups is genuinely very low.
There is a danger zone - pensioners, petrol car drivers, small biz - but also a lot of soft targets: banks, gambling companies, oil and gas, landlords etc.
[graph 8]
There is a danger zone - pensioners, petrol car drivers, small biz - but also a lot of soft targets: banks, gambling companies, oil and gas, landlords etc.
[graph 8]
October 29, 2025 at 11:03 AM
You can have robust public support to raise little while warping behaviour negatively to raise even less, or moderate support for a tax with robust income and minimal changes to overall behaviour(and those changes probably will be on the positive side). I’ll take broad but small and beneficial.
My sense is quite a bit is already being done and some great institutions out there but Britain is uniquely well positioned to endow every city with an unmissable museum or gallery. Lots of interesting ways to slice and dice things to provide locally resonant yet world class collections nationwide.
Break up the big museums
Don’t rob the Louvre but we should redistribute the world’s art.
open.substack.com
October 29, 2025 at 10:52 AM
My sense is quite a bit is already being done and some great institutions out there but Britain is uniquely well positioned to endow every city with an unmissable museum or gallery. Lots of interesting ways to slice and dice things to provide locally resonant yet world class collections nationwide.
Reposted by Simon Jeffrey
Unpopular opinion: not being ‘a good constituency MP’ does not necessarily make someone a bad MP. Where voters elect a party leader, they are making a clear choice. Reform voters in Clacton, Labour voters in Holborn or LD voters in Kingston complaining they ‘never see their MP’ can largely do one.
October 28, 2025 at 7:22 PM
Unpopular opinion: not being ‘a good constituency MP’ does not necessarily make someone a bad MP. Where voters elect a party leader, they are making a clear choice. Reform voters in Clacton, Labour voters in Holborn or LD voters in Kingston complaining they ‘never see their MP’ can largely do one.
Easiest thing to do is to rename the BSR the Building Swiftly Regulator and declare the entire enterprise an unparalleled success in the history of quangos. Swiftness has been almost entirely removed from the construction of tall buildings in England.
Outside of the emergency measures, sorting out delays at the BSR = a key issue.
The main issue, maybe? If my back of the envelope calculations are correct...
The main issue, maybe? If my back of the envelope calculations are correct...
October 28, 2025 at 1:55 PM
Easiest thing to do is to rename the BSR the Building Swiftly Regulator and declare the entire enterprise an unparalleled success in the history of quangos. Swiftness has been almost entirely removed from the construction of tall buildings in England.
The number of international tourist nights spent in London is about 120million a year or avg 320k per night. That foreign tourist poulation is the same as resident population of Nottingham or Newcastle or Cardiff council areas. And in high season tourists are probably closer to half a million.
Always fascinating watching people underestimate the size of London vs other UK ciries.
On an average weekday, more journeys are made on JUST the Elizabeth line than the ENTIRE population of Liverpool.
If the Tube was a city, its average daily passengers would make it the 2nd largest in the UK.
On an average weekday, more journeys are made on JUST the Elizabeth line than the ENTIRE population of Liverpool.
If the Tube was a city, its average daily passengers would make it the 2nd largest in the UK.
October 28, 2025 at 1:36 PM
The number of international tourist nights spent in London is about 120million a year or avg 320k per night. That foreign tourist poulation is the same as resident population of Nottingham or Newcastle or Cardiff council areas. And in high season tourists are probably closer to half a million.
Reposted by Simon Jeffrey
I am going to tap the sign:
________________________
|A tight labour market is|
|better for your policy |
|goals than any of your |
| policies. |
|________________________|
________________________
|A tight labour market is|
|better for your policy |
|goals than any of your |
| policies. |
|________________________|
False starts • Resolution Foundation
Nearly one million young people are now NEET (not in education, employment or training). Tackling this crisis requires stronger enforcement of participation requirements for 16-17-year-olds and an exp...
www.resolutionfoundation.org
October 24, 2025 at 9:28 AM
I am going to tap the sign:
________________________
|A tight labour market is|
|better for your policy |
|goals than any of your |
| policies. |
|________________________|
________________________
|A tight labour market is|
|better for your policy |
|goals than any of your |
| policies. |
|________________________|
Reposted by Simon Jeffrey
Sounds like time for a bunch of noblemen to come up with some rules for what the king is allowed and not allowed to do and force him to accept it, possibly writing it on some sort of big piece of paper, like a great charter
There is no settled law in the United States. Everything is essentially “common law” now. And not common law in the contemporary sense, but in the original sense — where the law was whatever the king’s court said it was.
October 24, 2025 at 12:44 AM
Sounds like time for a bunch of noblemen to come up with some rules for what the king is allowed and not allowed to do and force him to accept it, possibly writing it on some sort of big piece of paper, like a great charter
Preach. Bus fare cap is incredibly popular but genuinely harmful for wider affordability and accessibility of local bus networks. Not to mention rank centralisation of one of the most obviously local govt services. Lost routes can’t be restored/fares rise while a lucky few get a £150m windfall.
Labour is reluctant to get off the bus
A national bus-fare cap exposes the government’s fondness of central control
economist.com
October 24, 2025 at 12:18 AM
Preach. Bus fare cap is incredibly popular but genuinely harmful for wider affordability and accessibility of local bus networks. Not to mention rank centralisation of one of the most obviously local govt services. Lost routes can’t be restored/fares rise while a lucky few get a £150m windfall.
The quality of discussion available on demand to accompany a drizzly stroll is a crazy modern privilege. ‘Ever wondered how the CIA tries to get inside Xi’s mind? Well here’s the guy you who was doing that a few months ago’
The View from Behind Xi Jinping's Desk, with Jonathan Czin
spotify.link
October 22, 2025 at 10:18 AM
The quality of discussion available on demand to accompany a drizzly stroll is a crazy modern privilege. ‘Ever wondered how the CIA tries to get inside Xi’s mind? Well here’s the guy you who was doing that a few months ago’
Has there been a follow up on the Met’s claim that ‘western iPhones fetch £4k in China because they avoid censorship’ in this story? Would love to read about it IF TRUE but it smells extremely fishy. ‘Has the CCP left a huge hole in the Great Firewall … or is the Met chatting breeze to deflect’
One iPhone led police to gang who sent 40,000 snatched phones to China
BBC News is given access to what the Met Police says is the UK's largest operation against mobile phone thefts.
www.bbc.com
October 22, 2025 at 5:55 AM
Has there been a follow up on the Met’s claim that ‘western iPhones fetch £4k in China because they avoid censorship’ in this story? Would love to read about it IF TRUE but it smells extremely fishy. ‘Has the CCP left a huge hole in the Great Firewall … or is the Met chatting breeze to deflect’
Reposted by Simon Jeffrey
Time for 2025 updates to my annual “opinions about solar” thread. If you like these, you might like the second edition of my book, Solar Power Finance Without The Jargon. A 30% discount code WSQ0437 is valid on publisher website until end of November 2025.
www.worldscientific.com/worldscibook...
www.worldscientific.com/worldscibook...
Solar Power Finance Without the Jargon
www.worldscientific.com
October 20, 2025 at 7:43 AM
Time for 2025 updates to my annual “opinions about solar” thread. If you like these, you might like the second edition of my book, Solar Power Finance Without The Jargon. A 30% discount code WSQ0437 is valid on publisher website until end of November 2025.
www.worldscientific.com/worldscibook...
www.worldscientific.com/worldscibook...
Reposted by Simon Jeffrey
Bravo Cardiff.
“It’s only fair that those driving the biggest, heaviest and most polluting vehicles pay more for the extra space and danger they bring” - Spot on from @olord.bsky.social
Important: two-thirds (66%) of respondents to the related consultation agreed larger vehicles should pay more.
“It’s only fair that those driving the biggest, heaviest and most polluting vehicles pay more for the extra space and danger they bring” - Spot on from @olord.bsky.social
Important: two-thirds (66%) of respondents to the related consultation agreed larger vehicles should pay more.
Cardiff becomes first UK council to impose higher parking charges on larger vehicles
Premium charge aims to combat steep rise in SUVs and other larger vehicles which are ‘a danger to other road users’
www.theguardian.com
October 16, 2025 at 6:21 PM
Bravo Cardiff.
“It’s only fair that those driving the biggest, heaviest and most polluting vehicles pay more for the extra space and danger they bring” - Spot on from @olord.bsky.social
Important: two-thirds (66%) of respondents to the related consultation agreed larger vehicles should pay more.
“It’s only fair that those driving the biggest, heaviest and most polluting vehicles pay more for the extra space and danger they bring” - Spot on from @olord.bsky.social
Important: two-thirds (66%) of respondents to the related consultation agreed larger vehicles should pay more.