Never mind PL, surely you will mention the mighty Us incredible form with the demolition of Bristol Rovers - both Loft and Appere scored! Incredible scenes.

Completely agree. Really good read.

Reported

"A no 10 source" - let's just check how predictive those have been so far of the eventual outcome, shall we?

Yes - and they did. But franchises are no more.
Capacity is about whether the routes can take more trains or not full stop.
The revenue thing is to prevent the most profitable routes being gobbled away, leaving more subsidy required for the others.
Open access actually seems to work quite well?

Not quite. This is intended to stop Open Access operators from salami slicing off the most profitable routes, which otherwise the nationalised operators can use to cross subsidise the really unprofitable ones, to keep them affordable.

Totally agree. I think they aren't doing well. I just don't really see how anyone could have done better (without magically removing some of the real constraints).

I'm completely team "the only way out of this rut is huge investment" but I'm very glad I don't have to go into media studios and explain why that means hard working families hit by cost of living crisis will be paying lots more income tax and can't afford nice things while services are still crap.

Reinforced by the fact that most of their detectors to the left just shout "well, just tax more, duh", whereas realistically any taxes which would make any difference would a) hit most voters b) potentially depress growth further and c) release full media attack hell fury.

Isn't this because they don't really want to do these things at all, but they have somehow convinced themselves that the path to doing good things lies through fiscal rectitude at all costs and holding on for growth and then good things will be possible?

Insensitive! The ghost of Charles I, if we know anything about him, surely cannot nod...

I like the books, but the author gives the impression of not understanding/being able to make us understand the viewpoint of someone with a strong religious or ideological stance, which is, shall we say, somewhat of an impediment for the 16th century.
Lots of fun tho.

If I knew any Welsh swears, would employ them now.

I mean, presumably no one can actually bring themselves to write a briefing on "how to achieve your apparent aim of worse public services and an even more stagnant economy".

Maybe because the obvious one is "tax" and everyone knows if you say that out loud now, Downing St will flinch performatively and act like you've soiled yourself in public? So they're all waiting for some sign that now it's ok to hint at it...?

(Am speculating, am finding it baffling).

I know this isn't what you're saying, but I do think the government has a related problem, in that if they would just signal covertly which vortex of their impossible triangle they don't really mean, think tanks could provide some cover, but instead they're just stuck with 👀.

But isn't that precisely the point? We can all see with only a cursory glance the sort of things that would be required, and even uttering them makes them sound beyond ridiculous.
Think tankers are presumably not that delusional about their ability to sound clever talking crap.

I don't think it's even necessarily an actual group of voters.
I think it's an agglomeration of opinions, mostly weakly held because never challenged, and not all held by the same people simultaneously.

Interesting. I'd assumed it was because even the partisan think tanks don't think it's at all desirable, let alone deliverable?