Roger Mexico

One thing we can be sure of is that the "ongoing criminal investigation" wouldn't be happening without close coordination with the UK and possibly under its direction. If there were parallel raids in the UK (and maybe elsewhere) as with the Mone case it wouldn't surprise me. It might also explain any 'embargo' but it's rare for any of the media here to report any police actions independently rather than wait for the Facebook post or press release.

The original press release isn't quite as bad as the MR piece. It looks like it has since been put through an automatic informalising filter. The Report itself is truly dreadful - endless meaningless buzzwords and 'actions' that turn out to consist of "We will have lots of meetings".

It does happen because in the past there have been longish periods when the plant hasn't generated any electricity and reason given was that the turbine had been shipped off for maintenance.

There's a date on the bottom (frankly it's more organised of them than usual to do that). But it's not on the usual press release location. Edited to add: Separately issued by GSC here (bottom of links)

The list of conditions which automatically qualify for free medication is a bit arbitrary - for example diabetes is included but not something like COPD also requiring ongoing treatment. The English list is very similar and I suspect as usual they just copied that and whatever historical biases and special pleadings that were there. I'm a bit surprised that Mrs S got a certificate in the first place as the only more general condition is "A continuing physical disability which prevents the patient from leaving his residence without the help of another person", which mercifully doesn't apply here. The obvious route to go down is getting a prepayment certificate which, as my first link says: Pre-paid certificates cost £54 for 12 months, or £19 for four months – and any Isle of Man Residents, over 16 (19 if a full time student) can apply. This one off payment allows you unlimited prescription items while your certificate is valid. To get a certificate you just need to complete the application form, and return it by email to fps@gov.im or by post to Manx Care, Primary Care Services, Crookall House, Demesne Road, Douglas, IM1 3QA. The cost of the yearly certificate is equivalent to 14 items, for those with complex health needs or repeat prescriptions this may provide good value for money. The prepayment form is in a pdf here. Naturally you can't fill it in online, you'll have to download it, print it and send it with a cheque or without and they will ring you up to take your credit card details.

The road to Dublin is much improved. Seriously, that's about all Cannan could come up with (apart from waffle): https://www.tynwald.org.im/playaudio?file=/business/listen/AgainFiles/O-202401-1333a.mp3

Misadventure doesn't suggest any culpability on the part of the victims. But it doesn't suggest it on anyone else's part either, despite the evidence. But British law doesn't really like to hold anyone in authority to blame for anything.

Well quite. One possibly valid point that Cannan made was that the lack of properties for older people to downsize into. He said this was because bungalows were as expensive as houses, which I think simplifies the matter. But there seems no evidence to tell us what the actual requirements are. One of the features of the evening was politicians sighing "We need more data" without making any effort to commission ways to find out that data, or indeed use or understand the data that that they already have.

Not deferred after all, except for a day, starting on 30 April: Thirteen days, so presumably quite complicated, hopefully there will be decent coverage.

To be fair I'd say 100 was probably an underestimate if anything, particularly if you take into account that the format led to people coming and going over the evening. I'm not sure the venue would have coped with many more and still made it easy to mix. And who wouldn't want to watch a one-legged arse kicking competition? But while the format was useful (several people I saw using it to tackle Ministers on things affecting them), it didn't really tackle the bigger issues. The cluelessness shown over housing was notable in response to some of the better (and shorter) question. At one point Cannan praised the record number of households who had received government help through various scheme to move into their own place in the last year. It was 35. He then got offended when people burst out laughing.

Here's their statement via Facebook: The Southern Civic Amenity Site Board is aware of disquiet amongst some surrounding recent comments made on social media regarding its fair use policy at the site. The site has always had a fair use policy at the site. This policy was amended earlier this year from its previous policy of ‘six small bags’ per week, which effectively permitted users of the site to deposit around 100kg of waste per week at the site. To put this into context, the average weight of waste from a domestic 240L wheelie bin is 25kg and permitting 100kg a week equates to 5.2T per year which is equivalent of a 40 cubic yard container (the largest containers used at the amenity sites) from the site going to the Energy from Waste plant at a current cost of around £700. The revised fair use policy is now six small bags per month which is monitored by staff on the site. All amenity sites on the Island have a fair use policy and it is not unreasonable to have such a policy in place. Large scale DIY jobs and house clearances have always been outside of the acceptable use of the site. Should householders be undertaking jobs of that nature, then a skip should be considered which are available from several providers on the Island. Householders who visit the site regularly to deposit recycling, hedge trimmings, grass cuttings and the like from their day to day living should not be affected by the change. The Board is also aware of ongoing comments circulating regarding the closure of the reuse area at the site at the end of 2023. As the Board has previously stated, two of the contributing authorities did not accept the proposed budget for this financial year, which would have seen a reuse area and commercial waste acceptance continuing at the site. The revised budget reduced the overall expenses of running the site but also reduced staffing at the site by the equivalent of 1.5 full time employees. The Board has been working on alternative arrangements which would see the site being able to accept reusable items on behalf of a local charity which would in turn benefit a whole array of charitable causes within the South of the Island. If this develops as the Board hopes, this arrangement will see the charity making monetary donations to worthy organisations in the South covering a whole range of age groups and activities. Added 22 April 2024

The guy from Manx Radio was wandering around looking a bit lost. The problem is that they know how to cover a conventional political Q&A type meeting (sit back, press record, write it up later), but not something more scattered where they would have to be moving a lot. I suspect some of the people complaining about the format were those who had gone along wanting to be the centre of attention making a long speech at the Q&A. In fact some of those were the same people monopolising the Ministers beforehand. But at least then they were only monopolising one Minister not eight and boring the rest of us rigid at the same time. Apparently there was supposed to be a five-minute limit on the Ministerial chats, but no one bothered to inform anyone of this. On the whole (apart from the obsessives) people were respectful and gave way to the next in line, but it clearly was needed in some cases.

Quite a few CEOs were there but on the whole they weren't 'minding' in the chat bit at the beginning and you could approach the Minister or the CEO separately. A lot of the 'in the know' people tended to talk to the CEOs from observation - presumably because they knew who they were.

It's less than that, but his last Facebook post was in November, and from memory the last YouTube was about then as well (it's lost among all the Archive stuff). He last Tweeted late December when he was in Wellington, New Zealand, so maybe he's hiding away on a sheep farm, fleeing the IOMG hit squad. It is rather worrying, but being legally gagged seems more likely than being bought off.

As I've said before the convention is that Ministers don't ask other Ministers questions. I suppose it's because it makes it look as if they're not on speaking terms outside the Chamber. But of course asking a question in Tynwald or Keys isn't about finding out for yourself, it's about finding out for the public, so it's a stupid convention, but one they are expected to stick to. Even though it means that if both your MHKs are Ministers (as in all three Northside constituencies) there's no one to ask for you. Hence Moorhouse and recently Ashford asking about anything, including constituency matters in places they don't represent. Unfortunately Ashford's question too often seem to be designed to show how clever and well-informed he is (they fail) while Moorhouse's are designed to show how many questions he asks (well that succeeds). Anyway here's the latest league table: Moorhouse 129 Ashford 78 Thomas 76 Christian 19 Caine 19 Edge 16 Glover 14 Faragher 10 Watterson 8 Wannenburgh 5 Corlett 2 Haywood 2 Maltby 1 Mercer 1 It's not much different to the 2022-23 Session with Moorhouse way ahead (he asked at least four questions every time) and Ashford trailing behind. There have been 380 questions asked - well ahead of what the pro-rata from last year would have been at this stage. The difference of course is Thomas, who is snapping at Ashford's heels, though rather more focused. Although Edge was only sacked a month ago, she's also making up for lost time. I think Cannan is learning something about tents and urination. But as striking are the absentees (apart from CoMin). Nothing from Peters or Smith (again) and again from Callister. Is he hoping if he's a good boy they'll let him back in CoMin? Others have pretty low productivity as you can see, though some are more productive with Written Questions.

They won't do that - the walls might stay up.

Johnston was there from DfE as well, the only Ministerial absentee was Allinson, who had a 'prior commitment'. The only MLC I recognised was Mercer though I have some problem remembering the names of some of the others, never mind what they look like. Mercer's local so he may have been there as public rather than gov, just as Glover and Moorhouse were. I was surprised how many ordinary people were there as well. Quite a few staff, but they seem to have ditched the black polo shirts and let the CEOs come suited and the rest smart-casual. As usual with these dos the most useful bit is always the chance you have a chat to people one-to-one, not just the Ministers, but civil servants and other members of the public. This actually started straight away and took up about half the time. They then decided to do a Q&A to all of them, which was pretty much a disaster for entirely predictable reasons. There were a few good sensible and brief questions, but every obsessive in the South of the Island then stood up to make a long speech (some people were reading off them off iPads or whatever) about their hobbyhorse was or just kept repeating themselves at the same length or made equally long speeches complaining about everything under the sun. Cannan is a hopelessly weak chair of a meeting which didn't help. All of which meant that the possibility of holding anyone to account or getting a straight answer was reduced.

Reminder of the dates, times and places: Despite the registration button, you can just turn up: Doors will open at 5:30pm and attendees will have the opportunity to meet with ministers throughout the evening. You can register using the link on this page, or just turn up and drop in at any point during the evening. The venue is accessible, with car parking available on-site. The idea is that you are supposed to turn up and chat informally with the Ministers and there will be a 45-minute Q&A at some point in the two hours. Tea/coffee and biscuits on arrival.

Well it does, though possibly not the one they were hoping for. The main recipient seems to be out old friend [Redacted]. A very artistic type is [Redacted]. I suspect the problem as usual is the usual unwillingness of the Manx Civil Service to understand what GDPR means, so as to shield themselves from even the remotest suspicion of responsibility. It's nonsense of course here you can download all the grants of lottery money that Arts Council England give out by year. No redaction of individual names whether they are receiving money directly or for an organisation. The result is to make the whole thing look extremely dodgy, when in reality it probably is mostly OK. A more recent FoI that covered 2018-2023 (2875241) was even less helpful, claiming GDPR and not even giving the amounts or de-duplicating the list.

Looking at it further I wonder if the no-shows may have been caused by the poor design of the Eventbrite booking process or by the way the Netzero lot have set it up. On a laptop it seems impossible to book a slot after 11:45 on a particular day. So some people may have booked then intending to come later (or indeed think they had done so). In a comment on that FB post, the Church said that over 100 people had turned up in the afternoon as walk-ins. I haven't checked, but I assume it is possible to book later slots on a smartphone (which doesn't necessarily mean every smartphone of course).

He's right actually: Due to no shows at Gaia we will be welcoming some walk-in visitors, it is open till 4pm today. Less than half of ticketholders arrived to the 1pm session today. We kindly ask if you have tickets and can no longer attend, to cancel your booking to allow other visitors to book.Thank you. Not terribly surprising, especially for a Saturday.

From observation they tend to get used most, both in M&S and eg Shoprite Port Erin, by older customers who are waiting for the person who was helping them shop go and get the car to collect them - and possibly at the start where they were dropped off as well. So there is certainly a need. At Lake Road I suspect people end up having to be left in the parked car.

Wait till the 'geriatrics' start trying to use the self-service and see how long the queues get then. That's the problem the supermarkets have set up for themselves. Even if they detect fraud, it's difficult to prove and even worse if they successfully prosecute because other shoppers will stop using them for fear of ending up in Court from an honest mistake. As this CNN article from six months ago says, US supermarkets are starting to reverse the switch to self-checkout and losses to shoplifting are effectively double what they are in stores that have them.

It's surprisingly difficult to find out who the IOM Arts Council gives funding to. As with so much else recently there seems to have been a decline in the information available - I'm sure I've found Annual Reports easily in the past. I suspect the relationship with the Circus is one of underwriting against loss, but that is based only on a picture on their website where the concept is illustrated with a photo of the Circus (I assume): But it seems not unreasonable and I know it's been used to encourage other commercial entertainment to come to the Island in the past.

To answer all the cries about the beleaguered police force being overwhelmed by the night-time economy and there not being enough police to cope, it's worth pointing out that the latest reported number of police is 223, which would equate to 264 police per 100,000 population. In terms of England and Wales Forces, this would make it #7 highest in ratio of officers to population, with most of those higher being large centres of population (eg the Met, Merseyside).