Peter Brett

https://mastodon.me.uk/@krans

- Software Architect at Cadence Design Systems.
- Reluctant "C++ expert"
- Bicycle-riding tofu-munching foreign wokeratus.
🇬🇧🇪🇺🇮🇪

Signal: peter.47
Pronouns: he/him
Blog: https://blog.peter-b.co.uk/

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krans_at_mastodon.me.uk@momostr.pink

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Last Notes

2024-11-12 07:45:14

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This will simply not be possible without drastically reducing the emissions from transport.
I do not anticipate announcements about incentives to cut commuting, nor about massive investments in rail freight infrastructure.
#UKPolitics #ClimateChange #COP29

2024-11-11 11:38:53

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When considering Lords reform, let's think out of the box in selecting a democratic and representative solution.
END
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords
Essential reading:
"Against Elections: The Case for Democracy"
David van Reybrouck
isbn:9781609808105

2024-11-11 11:36:57

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No expenses scandals: centralize the provision of salary, offices, staff and family accommodation. Otherwise, carry over the roles and responsibilities of members of the House of Lords.
"But," I hear you ask, "What if some of the members are stupid, lazy, ignorant or prejudiced?"
Then it would indeed be a representative body.
There have been Prime Ministers that fit some or all of that description, and it didn't break the country yet.
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-11-11 11:36:05

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So, we require a democratic and representative way to create a revising chamber.
My preferred approach is sortition (aka random selection).
Take a statistically representative sample of 200 people from the electoral roll, every 5 years. Each voter selected who agrees to serve and passes security checks would serve in the "House of Jurors" for 15 years. Allow resignations for any reason at any time.
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-11-11 11:35:12

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Allowing Prime Ministers to appoint people results in "cash for honours" and stuffing the Lords with cronies -- and that's why we have such a ridiculous number of peers right now. (HOLAC's uselessness is for another thread).
Appointing members from chartered professional bodies and learned societies enshrines existing systematic inequalities.
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-11-11 11:34:48

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The "classic" model of the House of Lords is clearly not feasible.
Appointing members based purely on who their parents were creates great incentives to protect and preserve intergenerational inequality and directly creates a class-based system.
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-11-11 11:33:57

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So, this is why we need a revising chamber for fine-tuning legislation.
And, VERY IMPORTANTLY, it's why a revising chamber should *not* be appointed by popular election.
We can't avoid the revising chamber having perverse incentives. But we should make sure that its members have *different* incentives from those that influence MPs.
And that brings us back to the #HouseOfLords
#UKPolitics

2024-11-11 11:33:14

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Elections, especially general elections, provide an important opportunity to engage citizens in the democratic process and emphasise that their opinions matter and the voting decisions that they make have an impact. (The drawbacks of FPTP in this respect are for another thread).
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-11-11 11:32:50

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Similarly, the case work that MPs do is really important. It provides a means of last resort to address specific injustices or bureaucratic messes that constituents get into. It is an essential feedback channel to ministers and government departments. It is the source of the persuasive, relatable anecdotes that persuade the public of the benefits or drawbacks of government action.
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-11-11 11:31:58

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However, this doesn't mean that MPs should not be appointed by popular election.
The fact that the goverment must have the confidence of the Commons is very important. It ensures that, at any time, the government *must* retain a democratic mandate for their work. And having an election every 5 years is a very public and participatory mechanism to refresh and validate that mandate.
Popular election of MPs is why the House of Commons has primacy.
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-11-11 11:30:56

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These are counterbalanced by the requirement to win re-election within the next 5 years. MPs *must* focus on things that will retain or gain votes. This promotes voters over constituents, local desires over national needs, and short term wins at the cost of long term losses.
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-11-11 11:30:14

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Similarly, MPs have a perverse incentive in their assessment of legislation. They are supposed to represent *all* of their constituents (even those who voted for other candidates, or who cannot vote). They are supposed to make decisions that will benefit the whole UK, not just their constituency. They are supposed to take a long-term view of the needs of the UK.
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-11-11 11:29:15

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Focussing on doing case work, while making sure that their speeches in the chamber (which must always mention their constituency) are as pithy and clippable as possible, is much more likely to help an MP win re-election than figuring out that subsection 72(a)(ii) of the Widget Refrobnication Bill will unintentionally enable tax avoidance.
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-11-11 11:28:24

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This is a misconception. The most important job for any MP is to win re-election. Even those who are elected with the most honourable of intentions will acknowledge that you need power to accomplish things, and that having power means winning elections.
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-11-11 11:28:02

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Why? Surely MPs *principal job*, as members of the primary legislating chamber of parliament, is to make sure that bills are as polished and well-formed as possible, and to fully understand the details of every bill and amendment upon which they vote?
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-11-11 11:27:26

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MPs opinions on bills are, in the modern era, outsourced to ideologically-aligned think tanks. Watch a bill debate, and note how every contribution is a paraphrase of something a think tank's spokesperson will have said on a podcast or news debate show in the preceding days.
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-11-11 11:26:46

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In theory, MPs in the Commons are supposed to scrutinize legislation! But they generally don't. MPs generally do not come into their jobs with the educational background or expertise in British legislative wording to be able to scrutinize legislation in minute detail.
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-11-11 11:25:18

A thread on Lords reform, since it's topical.
What is the function of a revising chamber? Should we have one?
The function is clear: have a parliamentary body that scrutinizes legislation in detail to ensure it makes sense and won't have any bad, unintended consequences (along with a double-check that the intended consequences are good ones).
So, plot twist! This thread is mostly about the House of Commons.
#UKPolitics #HouseOfLords

2024-10-30 12:35:45

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Oh, that's very good news!

2024-10-25 12:26:53

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There are literally no more important things to deal with? 🙄

2024-10-15 21:16:17

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I played some of Nullius and it's very difficult and time consuming.

2024-10-15 17:16:14

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I've got to the point in my Factorio play where I've internalised the ideas that (1) all resources are infinite and (2) there's always something else I can work on while a production loop spins up.
Also spaghetti everywhere

2024-10-15 17:12:33

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FWIW my normal solution looks something like this
https://mastodon.me.uk/system/media_attachments/files/113/312/534/276/891/183/original/386ba39df0780c38.png

2024-10-15 16:04:01

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Oh, okay, yeah in that case circuits are required. Sorry for not understanding the problem being solved.

2024-10-15 15:59:12

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Bots are also not required

2024-10-15 15:56:48

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I'm not sure what your figure of merit is, but you can automate Kovarex with zero combinators. #Factorio

2024-10-13 07:31:23

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He says that he really enjoys playing the flute and he wants more people to have access to music education.
@npub1e98…qcv0

2024-10-12 07:17:10

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That sounds … promising?!

2024-09-26 08:22:31

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I wish I could vote for this manifesto

2024-07-09 07:18:09

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Does it offer the feature of allocation-free reset of an existing stream as a consolation prize?

2024-05-21 21:05:18

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I've just been down a rabbit hole. If Jony Rosenne is still around, they might be able to shed some light on how the blocks were assigned, since they were the author of the standards paper.

2024-05-21 20:44:29

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The first #Unicode #Hebrew codepoint is U+05BE HEBREW PUNCTUATION MAQAF.
It should be possible to check the archive of WG4 minutes and papers to look for corroborating evidence for whether there is a conspiracy or a coincidence. Members of the Unicode standards body hang out on Mastodon and may be interested in investigating further.

2024-05-21 20:44:29

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