The lower you go on the totem pole the dumber the grade of idiot boss becomes, so if you get one…

If you’ve been higher, you’ll find this more unbearable than if you were just working your way up. You’ll still have the same stresses of deadlines and pressure.

This. Be very careful of this. I took a job last year which was a step down as I wanted to get into a new sector (amongst other things) and my boss is totally out of her depth and widely disrespected and is fundamentally unsuited to being a line manager of any sort.

I’ve a lot more experience than her, generally, and particularly as a line manger and she’s spent most of the last 9 months trying to stop me from doing my job – taking it to such an extreme that it’s become quite noticeable and she’s already been had words with by her boss.

You may be able to cope with a step down but don’t assume those around you will be able to cope with your experience and maturity…

Contracting on the other hand gives you cash and a lot more freedom to get your job done.

Each to their own and all that, but i really don’t get it.
this urge to own/buy flashy stuff – lets to be honest to show off -is one of the most destructive and aspects of human nature.

Also, increasingly unfashionable in these days of increasingly inequality, environmental sensitivity and post-financial crisis debt angst.

I’d get really hacked off if I had a really nice, high-performace sports car in the UK – all that cash to get a superb bit of high-end engineering that can go like a turd off a shovel and then find myself spending so much time sitting in traffic jams which is the reality of UK driving now, and hoping not to get it scraped in the supermarket car park…

I’ve a mate living in abu dhabi who’s finally got himself a Dodge Charger – he’s wanted something like that for 15 years. Funnily, he doesn’t really care about it that much now he has it – it’s got a baby seat in the back for his daughter and all he really cares about now is his family… all that waiting and now he’s really not that fussed.

A mutual mate has the right idea – a Caterham – proper fun performance that you can actually get some fun out of on UK roads. Less of a fancy status symbol and more of a proper drivers car of course…

Remember people … some are glad when things go wrong for others … so no point pointing out to them that their political aims damage the lives of others … they love it. Don’t engage, unless it amuses you to do so. Nothing to be gained from it.

My Brexit-voting boss came up to me today and made a point of saying she was celebrating today. Our organisation was formally and openly Remain and we stand to lose significantly from Brexit at a time when we’re already in serious commercial difficulties irrespective of Brexit. She’s that stupid that she’s gloating about voting against her employer’s official policy at a vulnerable time…

How such small-minded people have managed to get so much influence is deeply depressing. I suspect it’s a nihilistic expression of ‘I’m losing and so therefore must everyone else….’

Anything to do with how to build relationships and communicate properly with your colleagues. Especially the maturity to put the organisation’s needs before your own.

IME a small increase amongst any workforce in the ability to do these things would make the UK immeasurably more successful and economically productive. My nephews and Godsons (aged between 7 and 11) are more mature than most of the managers in my current workplace. Seriously…

Is there the option to do a coaching course? Even if you don’t want to be a coach it will help you be a better listener and more able to understand other peoples’ perspectives

Also read Steven Covey, 7 Habits of Highly Effective People…

Thing is I now need to justify what this will bring to me and the organisation!

IMO, you’re asking yourself the wrong question here. Why not ask yourself what you can do which will add value to your colleagues and direct reports? (They’re real people with feelings, needs and humanity whereas ‘the organisation’ is a legal entity/artificial construct)

Truleigh Hill YHA or a B&B in Amberley – there’s a few

Stop the press!

Landlord attempts to rip-off tenant shocker!

One reason (among many) why the government are pushing out one-man band landlords in favour of corporates – they’ve heard it’s an easy way to make money and have no thought to their responsibilities (legal or otherwise) and no real loss if their tenants aren’t happy…

Landlords as a whole have killed their own golden goose through their own short-sightedness

come on in try and wake her up now”.

Actually it was

Call me when you try to wake her up / Call me when you try to wake her

I believe that came about because the lyrics were written by Michael Stipe whilst Berry, Buck and Mills wrote the music and then they crowbarred it all together into a song in the studio – hence the gabbling trying to fit in more syllables for which there were notes :-)

Roughly 40 years ago this year I learnt to ride on a Raleigh Dart. My brother had a Jeep.
Another one whose parents were so out of touch they thought a teenager in the 80s would be happy on a shopper bike. Still managed to go mountain biking on it though :-)

Long time fan here, got pretty much everything. Some beautiful melodies and Michael Stipe has some beautiful sentiments when you get to grips with a lot of his lyrics. Their reputation for being depressing is, IMO from people who’ve not actually listened to what he’s saying properly. Everybody Hurts for e.g. was showing great empathy for people feeling down – supportive, not negative.

Either way, I think they made the right decision to split when they did – I don’t think their songwriting was the quality it had been when they were younger and less famous.

I still rate Murmur as one of their best – Perfect Circle, Shaking Through – songs of huge beauty…

Fables, Life’s Rich Pageant, Green are the best of the early albums for me. Out of Time is a timeless classic, Automatic v good but have probably overlistened to it. Up, Reveal and Around The Sun have some great songs but maybe not as consistent as whole albums as the early stuff. Last album Collapse Into Now had some good stuff too.

If you don’t have access to a streaming service I would start with the IRS Best Of and the WEA Best Of and take it from there – they’re both accurate representations of their best stuff.

I’m hoping Michael Stipe will do some solo stuff – it’s bound to be interesting

Hezza is no fool.. He knew what he was doing and the consequences.

They weren’t the consequences, they were the objective…

May now looks like she’s scared of opposition and she looks like an autocratic dictator. It also frees up Heseltine to join Major in a stronger fight back now he’s no longer required to keep his mouth shut.

The Brexit camp generally now have to argue that even though their objective in leaving the EU is to ‘take back control’ and make Parliament sovereign, that in actual fact they don’t want to make Parliament sovereign after all..

The Lords have quite deliberately put them in this position IMO…

The most recommended comment on the Guardian’s story on Heseltine’s sacking says it all…

“27 other EU parliaments can veto the deal……..
except the sovereign UK parliament.

Taking back control.”

It’s pitiful watching a small number of lunatics getting manoeuvred into a corner like this. it would be hilarious (like a cross between Monty Python and Yes Minister) if it wasn’t having such a negative impact on our economy and international political standing and those of us down on the ground trying to survive in difficult times…

should all be disqualified from voting for not understand the basics of the issues at hand.

TBF, so should I. I had no idea about the Northern Ireland thing or the Scottish Thing, or the £60bn bill, or the Article 50 process etc etc. Funnily enough, no-one felt it necessary to tell us what it was all about, hence a bunch of people have voted against their own best interests without knowing they were doing it at the time.

It’s worrying seeing my manager at work (supposedly a Senior Marketing Strategy Manager) who voted out because she doesn’t like immigrants, and against the expressed interests of her employer, flail around trying to claim the economy’s ok and consumer confidence isn’t falling when it plainly is… she’s just had her fears of the outside world manipulated…

IGMC

I’ll Get My Coat or I’ll Get My Cheese?

More scots voted to stay part of the UK than the EU* – not that this forms part of the narrative!!

* canny folk despite the BS that surrounds them everyday

I’m no fan at all of the SNP, or Nationalism of any sort, nor politicians telling lies but we still have to acknowledge that the Scottish question and the various alternative scenarios are an additional level of complexity which were never included in the Brexit campaign nor discussed at the time of the vote – just another unintended consequence which looks likely to leave England worse off because of the Brexit vote – and one which I contend most Out voters did not think of… what a stupid mess

they seem to be settling in for a long fight – years maybe decades from what I’m hearing.

Where did you hear that?

It’s a sensible strategy IMO given the insane ad hominem that spews from Duncan Smith whenever anyone publicly stands up and makes a balanced Remain case (Blair, Major) – just keep stringing out the process, let it get ever more complicated and confusing, let the deal we’re offered look weak, sew seeds of doubt that we’ll be better off out, let us slip into lower living standards so people feel it in their pockets for real… falling pound = inflation, raise interest rates just a little to defend the pound and put a dent in house prices… none of it overt or obvious enough for Brexiteers to be able to attack without sounding like conspiracy theorists… a few years of this and we’ll find a shift in public opinion.
My parents haven’t changed their mind but they know I’m furious with them. Not just on my account but my nephews (their grandsons) who live in Ireland and so could well be disadvantaged by Brexit. Enough private conversations like this and we’ll see the less hardline Brexiters think more deeply about what they really want…
Not ignoring the impact of a fair chunk of the Out vote dying off…

BBC Radio 4 – Analysis

Def worth listening to this programme

How do the SNP sell a second referendum?
Analysis

Could a second referendum on Scottish independence yield a different result? In September 2014 when Scotland voted against becoming an independent country it seemed like the question had been settled for the foreseeable future. All that changed on June 23rd 2016 when the UK voted to leave the EU. Just a few hours later – before she’d even been to bed – Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon was already talking about the prospect of another vote on independence. Ever since she has been ramping up the rhetoric. But what would the SNP’s strategy be second time around?

There’s a massive complication once you include this in the Brexit mix

1. Another Scottish Referendum, Scotland leaves, UK no longer exists and England/Wales lose power and political stature in the world – and probably wealth as we lose investment attractiveness
2. Another Scottish Referendum, Scotland stays in UK and therefore forced to leave EU – cue decades of resentful Scottish Nationalism as Scots, who voted in c60% are furious with Little Englanders who forced them out of EU. Let’s not forget how dangerous motivated Nationalism is…
3. No Scottish Referendum, Scotland stays in UK and forced to leave EU – see pt 2

Another aspect, just like the Northern Ireland question which absolutely was not mentioned in the campaign, and was absolutely not a known quantity at the time we were at the polling booths. Both are potential tinderboxes given the social and political histories of both situations…

This is what happens when you take advantage of fear and parochical ignorance – all kinds of consequences which were obvious except to the people making the decision…

+1 for commending you for trying to do the right thing OP. Ignore some of the more unsympathetic replies on here – i suspect they’ve not experienced mental health problems or have had friends with them who needed support…

That said, I’ve had friends with mental health issues who, in all honesty, I felt were abusing my sympathetic nature and I ended those relationships in the end so it can be difficult to deal with people who’re in that place…

IMO your best course of action is to hand her over to the professionals – if you think she’s a suicide risk then it seems to me you have a perfectly good case for doing this – and they are definitely better placed to support her than you are. That way you have no guilt, nor the burden.

Consider calling non-emergency NHS or Samaritans if you’re not sure of what action to take?

Good luck

Children have to experience managed risk to prepare them for life, both in practical skills of risk assessing and the mental well-being of coping with risks and fear.

As a society we’ve already lost that IMO – look at the financial crisis, which apparently no-one saw coming, and look at how well we’ve learnt the lesson of excessive debt since… it’s got worse, not better. We’ve had the risks of our own mistakes hidden from us and so, we’ve learnt nothing.

And the increase in mental health issues, particularly amongst the young, whilst it may be increased diagnosis rather than occurrence, strikes me as people struggling to deal with the realities of life. Brexit too, IMO, was people struggling to deal with the harsh reality that we’re not as rich as we thought we were – hence tantrum and emotion instead of stoic acceptance and holding it together to rebuild and strengthen ourselves

Our misperception of risk is, funnily enough, killing us. e.g. by driving everywhere instead of cycling or walking from fear of getting hit by a car we’re dying of fatness instead.
I’m tired of getting talked to like I’m exceptional for cycling to work through winter because ‘it might be icy’ – it’s scary how deeply ingrained our poor risk perception has become.
There was a case in SE London about 5 years ago where the parents had to fight the council not to report them for letting their kids cycle to school… 8O

Best way to keep kids safe is for them to be exposed gradually and sensibly to risk, to ensure they build their own risk-perception capabilities and their own confidence they can deal with risky situations with their own resources…

whats wrong with the freewheel on that bike?

£300 for a full bike means they’ve skimped on the parts.
I had a Shimano freewheel on my singlespeed (cost £30) which lasted about 6 months. I replaced it with £80 worth of Whites Industries which is still going strong after zero maintenance about 3 years later…

If it has a flip flop hub then find a quiet street and play about with fixed and see how you get on with it. IME it’s personal preference more than anything.
Fixed has its benefits (low maintenance for e.g.) and it’s downsides (takes skill and alertness to ride in traffic, can have serious consequences if you forget to stop pedalling, the chain comes off when riding or losing your finger if you stick it anywhere near the chainring or cog when cleaning/doing maintenance)

Give it a go in a safe environment and see how you feel…

Not so much consent, more that we love our cheap consumer crap more than we care about pretty much anything

The only other thing we care more about is our free hundreds of thousands of pounds of housing equity without caring too much that it comes at the expense of the younger generation and the poorer members of society and the wider economy.

You buying goods from China will slowly lead to the erosion of the CCP’s grip on power.

There’s some truth in this but autocrats tend not to give up power in a peaceful and willing manner – they crave control and power because they need it to shore up their insecure personalities

Auto loans are the next bubble to burst. Not sure what that means for the debtor rather than the creditor but anyone who thinks this tidal wave of free money being thrown at us comes at no longer term cost is an idiot who’s clearly not paying attention, and hasn’t been since 2008…
Buying a depreciating asset on debt always used to be known as something only very stupid people did but now we appear to be doing it en masse – something like 80% of cars in UK sold on finance now

Can I see your working?

Well, if I was stupid enough to have voted out then I’d think that 52% of 70% was ‘all the people’ but as I’m not that stupid I accept your correction… :-) though of course the point still stands… the less we’re willing to pay for UK-produced goods and services the faster the economy will go down the pan as the jobs go abroad and remaining workers get testy… as we’re currently finding out…

No wonder half the country’s broke and just voted to leave EU in protest! FFS… £6! Or do we not care about people struggling by on low incomes so long as we’re ok…

Thank goodness there’s businesses run like Timpsons – proving capitalism can be a force for social good at the same time as providing decently-paid jobs and creating wealth for the owners and shareholders.

The confounding thing about Timpsons is that the Chief Exec’s brother is a Tory Minister – so luckily for us not all Tories are of the May and Osborne variety… just rather a lot of them, sadly

I don’t think there’s that much difference in the tax I pay as a perm than I did as a contractor – my salary is a lot lower than my day rate annualised…

I contracted for four years and far far preferred it to perm – a sense of ownership and my expertise being respected, being able to get things done the way I felt best, and to be myself rather than ‘the company man’, and also some of the most interesting work I’ve ever done… Having clients instead of bosses makes life a lot easier…

That said I went back perm when I couldn’t find any work at all – was unemployed for 6 months in 2015… contracting is no fun at all when you’re out of work.

Either way I can’t wait till I’ve got 3 years on my CV in my current perm role and I can leave with a decent stint on my CV, and go back contracting… so long as the government haven’t screwed up a way of working which, when used appropriately can be far superior for both worker and company…

Mint Sauce captures the essence of mountain biking and it was all set in South Downs.

There’s no ‘big sky’ feeling like the SDW over 2 days in June.

Ditchling Devil last summer was epic.

South Downs are an under-appreciated jewel of SE England

That’s a very generous donation OP that you’ve made to our tax take which is badly in need of greater inputs at the moment. You’ve contributed in a small way to the costs of running the NHS, which, in part, is there to treat the victims of lousy drivers who, amongst other things, ignore speed limits which are set to reduce the number of deaths and injuries caused by lousy drivers :-)

Surprised no-one’s mentioned price yet. I guess it depends where you are but I wouldn’t go anywhere near asking price at current levels – London/SE and anywhere within commuting reach of London is bubble levels and you want to be offering low enough to protect yourself from negative equity.

Exhibit A:

The gap between asking and sold prices now at 27%

I think it’s fair to say that anyone involved in politics…how can I put this..is not quite right in the head.

This… politics as a profession is more about desiring power and influence than anything else.

In terms of more ‘normal’ people. Of the people I’ve known who were the most party political (members of a particular party, very dogmatic in their political views, very judgemental of people with different political views), there were elements of poor mental health also present. These are people I know very well – family or friends for some 15+ years.

My view is that it wasn’t their political views which made them unhealthy per se (the people I’m thinking about came from both left and right ends of the spectrum) – they had all had traumatic childhoods and found the world and all it’s shades of grey very difficult to deal with – and they found political dogma very comforting as it simplified the world for them and gave them a set of rules to follow and a tribe to belong to.
There were diagnoses of depression and stress in all of these people…

So my view is people with poor mental health may well find political dogma attractive as a way of coping with the randomness and challenges of the real world…

Liberals on the other hand, drift around in the middle somewhere without any real dogma or ideology as they’re largely at peace with themselves and the world, hence being happy for others to live their own lives as they see fit and are happy to form their own opinions rather than being dependent on someone else’s dogma.

It’d be interesting to see any formal research which enlightens this debate, especially as we’re currently polarising.

I think the rise of the far right across the West is a response from insecure people of the rise of liberalism – the lack of black and white scares them silly – they just can’t cope with the lack of rules that society is operating in – hence someone like Farage or Le Pen comes along with their right wing rhetoric and they swallow it whole – like a child with a comfort blanket.
There may be a link here between our ageing population and the move to the right – not that older people are more right wing but in a world which has changed so much so fast, it’s harder for older people to cope than younger people, therefore older people find the far right dogma more appealing than the young do. So hopefully in 20 years time liberalism will come back to dominate…

Listening to some of the Brexiteers I work with grasping hold of random bits of data to prove they were right all along (who in theory are working in a strategy role, using data and facts to decide what direction we should go in 8O ), I think this quote is particularly apt:

“Only stupid people don’t change their minds.” — Boutros Boutros-Ghali

The Dunning Kruger Effect is particularly relevant too

IMO one reason Eastern Europeans are prepared to do jobs Brits are not is they see them as temporary, they live simply (eg house sharing) amd send money home where the cost of living is much lower

A very good reason why we should never have let cost of housing get so far out of control – it makes indigenous workers more expensive to employ as they need a much higher salary just to survive. I notice the anti-immigration, pro-high-house-prices Tories have forgotten to mention that…

I’m just going to put this out there as food for thought for those with more than one property/those who think we don’t have a problem and no-one’s really impacted by unaffordable housing…

https://www.ft.com/content/d85a3696-f2bb-11e6-95ee-f14e55513608 (Google “More UK households fall below minimum income level”

Nearly a third of people in the UK live in a household where there is not enough money for adequate food, clothing and housing and the basics of a social life, up from a quarter at the start of the financial crisis, according to new research.

Same story in the Guardian but I put up the FT version to show this isn’t some lefty heart-bleeding story…
More people in poverty

Since 2008, the biggest growth in jobs has been in the South East and it’s unlikely to change, so property demand stays high.

So how do you explain falling prices in Prime Central London (-12%YOY), 45% fall in transactions, Foxtons shares on the floor and an exodus of 30 somethings… property demand is not price inelastic – when prices get to the level of unaffordability that London’s at, people leave – whether to home counties, rest of UK or emigration – I know people who’ve done all of these things in recent years…

From the FT story this evening that prices are still, apparently, rising:

Spring 5 hours ago
No mention of volumes! 

I’m told there’s no supply so are these figures must be based on a false or extremely restricted market. Clarity needed.

As usual the FT yahooing the market. No relation with the advertising dollars they receive for the Property Section I presume….

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Bananalyst 4 hours ago

@Spring Agreed. Nearly all the properties I’ve been looking at in London have been “open to an offer” according to the agent. It’s a buyers market with cheap financing, how often can that happen?

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Artemesia 3 hours ago

@Spring 

What is happening is that greater and greater chunks of London are becoming unaffordable and there are few transactions in those areas- only foreigners with dollars can buy. Further out and downmarket there are still some being bought with bank of mum and dad etc and prices are still rising. Soon there will be no transactions there either. 

It is a huge (or should I say ‘uge?) bubble which is bursting in slow motion because there is no single big trigger. Yet.    

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/B 3 hours ago
@Artemesia @Spring and when it does burst? A week later: FT – nobody saw it coming. 2008 redux.

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Spring 3 hours ago
@Artemesia Agreed. No volumes suggests that someone is wrong and the market is not in equilibrium. The question is whether it’s the seller or the buyer who’s deluded. 

2-3% gross yield looks way out of whack to me for an illiquid asset that has a large cost of carry. I reckon you need 6%+ yield to justify buying a house so I won’t give you too many guesses which side it is that’s deluding itself.

I’ve no idea how the average punter manages to buy any more.

Simple answer to that – average punters aren’t. Median London salary c£35k, 2-bed flat in Zone 3 £425k+

Only those with massive help from parents (average FTB deposit is c£90k in London) or those earning well above average salaries are buying. There’s only so many people like that which is why transaction numbers are down c45% YOY and several places I know in Crystal Palace which were on the market 18 months ago are still unsold or have been taken off the market – no buyers at current prices. Foxtons share price collapsing tells you that transaction volumes have cratered too.

My South London cycling club has lost 6 members in the last year – mainly because we can’t afford to live there any more, and based on the amount of Rapha amongst members we’re not low earners generally speaking!

It’ll straighten out eventually – demand for property isn’t price inelastic – which will be pretty painful for anyone who bought in the last few years – mainly forced to by sky high rents and fear of missing out.

Why should they?

Because – the wider community and economy can’t afford it.

1. High housing costs killing the real economy
2. High debts reducing living standards
3. Forcing younger generation into lifetime of debt
4. Increasing homelessness
5. Couples not having families because they can’t afford property big enough for kids, or having kids late and suffering the complications…
6. Massively long commutes from living miles from work = less sleep, more stress and depression, lower productivity
7. Both parents being forced to work and not being able to have one parent at home looking after the kids
8. Mental health issues in the young on the increase
9. Increased inequality
10. Setting ourselves up for another massive debt-driven bust when we’re still on our knees from the last one.
11. Communities being torn apart as people have to leave where they live to go somewhere more affordable
12. London/SE struggling to find teachers/police etc as no-one on those wages can live there anymore

… need I go on? There’s more than your own pension provision/family needs at stake here, or does wider society just not matter in the UK now?

we are keeping the uk one and going to rent it .

And there you have one of the causes of the crisis. You know we have a major housing crisis in the UK – why don’t you sell it to someone who wants somewhere secure to bring their kids up?

Housing will straighten itself out eventually – just read up on the psychology of speculative bubbles. We’re on historic highs of prices and price to wage ratios only manageable because of historically low interest rates. It’s not sustainable – we’re talking election-losing situation here, affordable housing’s essential to a working economy, it’s not a speculative commodity like tulip bulbs.

All this ‘supply and demand’ guff is just that – the hyper inflation we’ve seen in London/SE the last few years has been billions of foreign money pouring in to prime central London (much of it being laundered) and the locals borrowing themselves to an early grave to try and keep up. 10% a year on house prices when wages are flat is almost entirely excess supply of money into a tight market, not ‘demand’. BTL doesn’t help as it just pushes up prices and takes supply out of the market (as well as increasing the risk of a bust when prices fall)

Osborne massively screwed up with HTB – and once he realised this he was too late with his stamp duty, killing BTL and other limits to the flood of cash, hence London is now unaffordable and the bubble’s pushed out to the wider SE and even Bristol, Milton Keynes etc – the Tories need mass home ownership if they want to stay in power and the trend’s in the wrong direction for them now.

As mentioned above – the banks are in a better position now to allow a fall, they were stress tested to a 35% crash – although in London that would only take us back to where prices were 3-4 years ago… Prime London’s 12% down YOY so it could have started already.

Those on the ‘winning’ side are being duped into thinking they’re rich whilst those of us who’re not are either facing retirement in poverty, paying rent out of our pensions or massive debt to pay a mortgage and lower living standards for life – it’s very divisive and massively reducing the amount of cash people have to spend in the real economy, providing jobs and wider economic activity.

London’s losing out too – a lot of people leaving – even employers are complaining they can’t afford to pay people what they need to live there – and knackering the most economically productive part of the UK isn’t sensible. My cycling club’s beginning to lose members too – it’s impacting communities as well.

2017 will be interesting – Chinese money is slowing up, foreign buyers are renting to avoid stamp duty, 30 somethings are leaving London, Foxtons shares are dying fast (400p in 2014 to less than 100p now), BTLers are selling up before tax rules change in April, thousands of overpriced luxury flats coming onto the market and not selling, consumer confidence falling and the risk of the City losing its status because of Brexit…

The attitudes of the ‘haves’ is pretty unpleasant to watch as they blame the younger generation for ‘spending all your money on phones’ and totally ignore the fact its the actions of government, BoE, banks, builders, councils and existing homeowners that have created the crisis.

Sadly, the badly needed correction will do huge amount of damage to those who’ve failed to save or build a pension pot, assuming they could cash in their equity at a time of their choosing…

There’s a chain of lousy fathers in my family – my mum’s parents wouldn’t allow her to marry the man she wanted to because he was a Catholic (this was Cheshire in the 1960’s, not Belfast!) and my dad was mistreated (probably physically abused) by his father – at least once he threw a fork at him so hard it stuck… 8O

There’s several people over the years have migrated, my dad’s brother, my brother, one of my cousins so I suspect there’s heritage in mistreating children that’s been going on for generations.

The only sympathy I have for my parents is they were certainly badly treated by their own parents, but I don’t think I’ll ever forgive them for the damage they’ve done – to me, my brother and the family unit – they had the choice to hold back but they didn’t. I think they recognise the damage they’ve done having seen all the difficulties me and my brother have had but they’re too cowardly to say sorry or even acknowledge it. I’m dreading their funerals, having to stand up and make positive comments about them because it wouldn’t be socially acceptable to talk about the stuff they did behind closed doors.

My brother’s my hero in this respect. He treats his boys with the utmost love and respect – he’s clearly decided that the chain of abuse will stop with him and he won’t use his own abusive childhood as an excuse to bully his own kids. It takes courage to do that.

I used some to repair the mudguard on my commuter a year ago and it’s still going strong – seems pretty tough to me and not coming unstuck at all