Why We Shouldn’t Care About MP Scandals

One thing that is synonymous with British politicians is scandal and for some reason it’s mainly sex scandals. Sure, they also have a history of taking money from companies to ask questions in the House of Commons but the one thing we know will happen is an MP will do something that’s naughty and get caught.

Who knows how many aren’t getting caught. If your place of a work had a subsidised bar you might also get caught out being a wrong ‘un.

With names like Chris Pincher and William Wragg being in the news for various pleasures of the flesh we ask if we should be surprised, and if we’re not surprised should we even care?

If an MP is arranging some sex meet-up is it any of our business? And if we didn’t judge those who do would it become impossible to blackmail someone for such an act?

Here’s part of an interview on Times Radio with Steve N Allen explaining more.

@mrstevenallen

Why we shouldn't care so much about politician's illicit scandals for our own sake. (From Times Radio)

♬ original sound - Steve N Allen

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EE Says Don't Buy Phones

Are you addicted to your mobile phone? I am. I will probably check my devise several times while I write this. I’ll let you know the tally at the end but if I, as a fully grown adult with will power, can struggle to put it down how can we expect children to not be damaged by such technology?

The network provider EE made the news by telling parents of primary school children not to buy smartphones for their kids. At first glance it seems strange for a company to be telling potential customers to not buy their products. The full advice from EE also suggested that it would be better to buy them a non-smart device, a brick phone as they are called, that can only make calls, send texts and probably play Snake.

I’m sure your local EE outlet will furnish you with a burner phone although I’m not sure your kids need the same kind of phone that people smuggle into prison to commit crimes on.

There is a strong chance that this act of apparent commercial self-sabotage is exactly the opposite. If you’re in the business of selling something that people are starting to consider harmful to children, you might want to make it clear that you’re not in favour of letting the young ones get their hands on your kit.

There isn’t loads of data proving the harmful effects of phone use. Some research has found a link between screen time and disrupted sleep, which is quite serious for school children. Messed up sleep can impact the next day’s learning.

Some studies found a link between social media use and the mental health in teenage girls. I didn’t have access to Instagram when I was at school and I also wasn’t a teenage girl, but just the thought of having to deal with the mean girls at school who can use those apps to reach beyond the playground is terrifying. If I’m honest, I still cross the street to avoid a bunch of teenagers in case they pick on my trainers.

Even without lots of studies it feels like smartphones are too much for children. You must have seen it, if you’re out for a meal and the family on the table next to you put a phone in front of a toddler to sedate it. It works. They can tap on a phone for hours but that doesn’t feel natural. You’re secretly hoping the kid has found the right links to tap on to buy hundreds of pounds worth of games credits.

It is possible to bring up a child without giving them a phone because that’s how we were raised. I spent most of my childhood begging my parents to put a landline phone in my bedroom. Not a separate line, just a cable that let another phone be plugged in. I never got it but that’s for the best as I turn out as a painfully introverted type who hates speaking on the phone anyway, so it would have been a waste.

I managed to navigate childhood without having an array of apps in my pocket.

I have enjoyed the fact that maths teachers used to say, “You have to learn this. You won’t always have a calculator in your pocket,” and these days we do. But don’t buy your child a smartphone or a brick phone. Just buy a basic calculator. It’s safer and you can still have hours of entertainment typing 58008 on it. That is also the number of times I checked my phone.

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Amazon Delivers By Drone

People are predicting the death of the High Street… again. It’s not been well for a while but where else will you get your stuff? Oh, that’s right, the internet.

Amazon is preparing to debut what the newspapers have been calling its “futuristic new device”. It’s a drone. It’s not that futuristic. It’s what divorced dads have been playing with on weekends for years now.

The Amazon drone rollout is part of a test across various industries, including off shore wind and the police, to see if drone flying out of the line of sight of the operator can become part of day to day life.

So, it will either be the way that items are delivered to your door, if this goes well. Or, the way 17 people will be decapitated in the news tomorrow. Only time will tell.

Amazon is hoping to launch its Prime Air service in the UK by the end of this year. How will a drone be able to knock on your door or leave the parcel in a safe place? Let’s be honest, it won’t. It will be able to carelessly drop it over your garden gate, so it might replace the need for Evri drivers.

Amazon has already identified what it has described as a “lightly-populated suburban area” for its trial run. That area has not yet been made public. But if you live in a lightly-populated suburban area, maybe wear a hat.

There’s no point resisting. This is like the moment letters were replaced by email or the self-scan till come out. You can moan but you’ll be using it in a few years time. And there’s no point making an enemy of Amazon. They know where you live and they have drones now.

Meanwhile... oh, this is awkward, why not click on the sponors of this post, and, oh...

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Oh, update!

After posting this on the site I was contacted by an expert on this topic. Here's the quote I was sent from Barbara Pareglio, Senior Technical Director, Smart Mobility Lead, GSMA on the role 5G technology plays in ensuring drone technology integrates safely into the UK airspace.

“Drones are helping organisations across industries from logistics, manufacturing, agriculture and public services to do tasks faster, safer and cheaper. And the role 5G technology plays in elevating drone performance is paramount. With 5G networks and wide area coverage, drones can operate beyond visual line of sight, opening up possibilities for multi-drone missions, automated flights, and improved cost efficiency for a range of commercial industries and organisations.

“When it comes to safety in automating deliveries and materials handling for logistics companies, 5G’s low-latency capabilities ensure seamless communication and mitigate risks to humans by providing relevant data like people density over the flight path. 5G also enables advanced communications and edge application hosting for better performances, as well as image and video traffic aggregation.”


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Humza Yousaf’s Free Cell-Phones

While Humza Yousaf isn't the first former First Minister to have questions asked about money, in this case at least it was just a stupid idea that cost the Scottish taxpayer £6m.

The Scottish Government forked out that much cash to give criminals free Nokia phones during the Covid pandemic. A new report has found that... well, you can probably guess. They were used to commit crimes.

Well, in Humza's defence, how was he supposed to know that people in prison for committing crimes were the kinds of people who'd commit crimes?

Enough Nokia phones were bought by the Scottish Prison Service to give every one of the approximately 7000 prisoners in custody two phones each. Why would they need a spare phone? Were they having an affair?

While it was £4.1m on the phones. (BTW, 7k prisoners, 2 phones each, 14k phones. £4.1m on 14k phones means it was £293 per phone – even I could have got them cheaper phones from the shop on the High Street that sells vapes.) The rest of the money was spent on boosting the phone signal so they could get clear reception on their free phones. This must be upsetting if you're living in Norfolk and you can't get more than one bar even if you wave your phone in the air. They'll be mad as soon as they manage to get enough signal to see the internet.

While the phones were restricted the problem was it was possible to swap out the sim card. Traditionally in prisons any mobile phones have to be smuggled in using nature's pocket. That's easier when all you have to do is cram a sim card up there.

The Nokia 8310 looks like it could go up there OK (£20.98 on eBay – I told you I could get a better deal) and the off-brand Zanco Tiny T1 (46.7mm x 21mm x 12mm) would be a pleasure. All of these plans hit a problem when you realise you need the charger and we have a three-pin plug in the UK.

There were more than 8000 security breaches, including drug deals, hit jobs and the fire-bombing of family homes.

So they scrapped the scheme to give prisoners free mobile phones. Instead they gave them free landlines into their cells. The thing that I begged my parents for and never got, the criminals now get for free.

This all took place when Humza Yousaf was justice secretary, so before Nicola Sturgeon resigned and her husband was arrested. It leaves you wondering, was this all long-term planning to make sure they could still stay in touch if the worst happened?

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This Noise Will Make You Lose Weight

There’s some good news if you wanted a quick way to lose weight. I mean, that good news is the fact that they have invented some drugs that do they now, but let’s pretend we don’t know about those and look at this. A new ‘random noise’ technique could help you lose weight by slashing cravings and emotional eating.

Zapping the brain with "random noise" could starve cravings and stop emotional eating. It’s important to point out that it is electrical signals and not just noise. Don’t just play a zoo format breakfast show in your ears in the hope of it making you slim.

So, yeah, electric shocking your brain helps you lose weight. I have seen One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and I believe you.

The study found that using electrical brain stimulation for 20 minutes per day just six times reduced appetite, willingness to eat, and hunger for two weeks.

Two weeks? So all we know if that it works for a fortnight. That won’t help you get beach ready. But I always say, everyone is beach ready if you stop caring about the other people on the beach.

For all we know, taking part in a trial can change your eating habits for two weeks. I’ve had milk in the fridge for longer than that and at the end of that time the milk would also help you stop feeling hungry.

The therapy, called transcranial random noise stimulation (tRNS), works through simple skull caps and has already been found to lessen depression.

You might look slimmer and fitter but that skull cap might put you off. Just as all our devices have gone wireless we find a need to plug ourselves in.

But do it. Why not? At least you won’t go on and on about your diet to people who don’t care.

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Strictly Come Dancing Is In Trouble

Some have been calling it a massive blow to Strictly Come Dancing as the BBC show has only managed to sign just 6 women amid the bullying scandal.

Oh no, don’t. Stop, no. That’s terrible. How will we cope?

Now that you have recovered from the shock, the news is that Strictly will have the fewest female celebrities in the show’s history, which has sparked fears the bullying scandal has put women off signing up.

If you haven’t been following, there have been accusations of bad treatment by some of the professional dancers as they tried to teach the celebs. It’s appalling if true and sadly unsurprising. “Fiery” is a problem with dancers. Bruno couldn’t finish a sentence without jumping out of his chair, so it’s not a shocker that some other dancers mix up passion with being an arse.

Normally the should would have 7 or 8 women, this time they have 6. Are you telling me they couldn’t find 2 female celebs who’d do it to boost their career?

On I’m A Celeb the next time it’s on there’ll be two celebs willing to eat kangaroo ball to get back on the game show circuit, they’d be willing to be shouted at by an Italian.

Celebrity SAS involves celebs being shouted at, so that’s basically what Strictly is. I suppose the clue was in the title.

It is sad. Remember when the Strictly curse was about having an affair with a hot dancer?

Fire from Gladiators is one of the women. She’s a former Olympic sprinter and bobsleigh athlete. Whichever male pro-dancer bullies her, I wish him a speedy recovery.

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Oh God, Robert Jenrick

Robert Jenrick was criticised for saying people shouting ‘Allahu Akbar’ should be arrested. Does he think Allahu isn’t akbar? Is that the issue?

He had a busy day doing the media rounds so he was bound to say something that got him in trouble. He went on to talk about far-right protests, tried to not say Muslim protests, he called them secular protests and then on Sky News says people should be arrested for saying “Allahu Akbar”.

He forgo the context. It matters. Context tells you if you is said is a problem or not. Shouting “fire” in a crowded theatre is a problem but saying it in a quiz show where you have just been asked to name one of the elements is different. See, it’s all about context.

In general its an Arabic phrase that means God is great. So it’s not a 100 miles away from saying, “Oh, God!” or, “Lordie Lordie!”, “Mon dieu!”

He said: “I thought it was quite wrong that somebody could shout ‘Allahu Akbar’ on the streets of London and not be immediately arrested.

Did he mix this up with the people shouting Jihad? Months back there was a news story about protesters shouting about jihad and people were saying, “Oh, it means struggle.” Again, context is key. If you’re shouting it while trying to find a parking space it’s very different to shouting on an anti-Israel march.

But, the bottom line is, you can’t ban people from shouting out God’s name. How else are you going to finish sex?

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