Can a UK plug have round pins?

[Fredxx]

I recall my father doing just the same.

Isn't it now a 'safe-zone'?

[JNugent]

Motor oil (of the Duckham's, Castrol type varieties) was zero rated (not sure whether that was theoretically different from "exempt").

Energy and fuel - of every type- was zero-rated until Wilson put 10% on motor fuel (just like that!) in 1974. Then the next year, he reduced the VAT on diesel to 8% (along with many other things) and increased the VAT on petrol to 25% (along with various other "luxuries").

It was odd, because in during the campaign for the early 1974 general election (amidst the three-day week), he had criticised the Heath government for not reducing the pump price of both by reducing the excise dity on them (then the only tax they bore).

As a result, many people (I was connected tenuously with Ford at Halewood, though not working there - and the whole factory was alive with the rumour) took the view that that was what Wilson was going to do if he got elected.

He did the opposite.He maintained the duty and added VAT to it (and to the duty).

Well, when the flat 10% was brought in, the country was surging ahead economically (up until late 1973).

By 1975, after a year or more with Wilson and Callaghan, that had changed.

[JNugent]

Incredible! :-)

[JNugent]

...wow!

[JNugent]

Increasing revenue often isn't their central aim.

[The Natural Philosopher]

There is a you tube channel featuring a guy who fixes cars/trucks/tractors in Illinois - 'Watch Wes Work' There is NO MOT at all there. Stuff comes in and goes out with 3/4 of the chassis simply rusted out and missing.

[JNugent]

Ours was built in 1963.

When we bought it in the early 90s it hadn't had a hand's turn of work since it was built. It was equipped with nine single sockets equivalent (of which two were in the small kitchen).

Hall: 1 Living room: 2 Dining room: 1 Kitchen: 2 Bed 1: 1 Bed 2: 1 Bed 3: 1

However... we were given access to the property after contracts were exchanged and had a kitchen fitter do an upgrade and add a couple of extra outlets (mainly using double-gangers).

The single socket in Bed 1 is still there, but inside a built-in wardrobe so never seen.

[JNugent]

Some states do have annual or biennial "inspections". I know that CA and TX do.

But I'm heading over to "Watch Wes Work" right now...

[Dave Plowman (News]

Surging ahead? Can I ask what job you did? I can well remember the threshold payments Heath introduced - to try and protect some from raging inflation.

[JNugent]

You may (rather than "can"), but you shan't get an answer to that irrelevant question.

1973 was the record year, for instance, for new car sales and registrations. The L and M registration dominated the road scene for years thereafter. That could not have happened in anything but a quickly expanding economy.

But don't worry... Wilson was on his way back within a year with plans to change all that from a boom to a more socialist set of circumstances.

"Raging"? :-)

You are thinking of Wilson and Callaghan's 27+% inflation (1975/1976), unmatched in modern times outside Weimar Germany.

[Sn!pe]

JNugent <jennings& [e-mail] wrote: [...]

A common trick was to put a stub of blackboard chalk into the current bullying victim's inkwell, so his nib couldn't dip properly. Then there were inky blots twanged across the schoolroom with rulers...

[Dave Plowman (News]

Didn't expect to. As long as you were alright, Jack.

And then we had the oil price inflation. When you couldn't give away large new cars.

Wonder if a good Tory like you will blame the current government for inflation caused by a world wide increase in energy prices? No? Wonder why that would be...

[Custos Custodum]

Calcium carbide, which was still available from the local ironmonger in those days, was fun too. Just as well no one thought to light it.

Or well-chewed paper flicked onto the ceiling. Looked like some sort of fungal growth.

[Mark Carver]

Hard to tell, it's pitch dark ?

[Tim Streater]

No, you're right, it isn't. Their central aim is punishment. We can't have people enjoying themselves and being happy.

[Fredxx]

Just that some of us go to bed and neither sleep or reading are uppermost in my mind.

[Animal]

ISTR that the MOT system makes less than 1% difference ot accidents.

[williamwright]

It happened to me when I was camping near Yarmouth.

Bill

[williamwright]

What's up, have you got a small dick?

Bill

[JNugent]

Doesn't surprise me.

I once had to do a ten-mile urban tour from house to house early on New Years' Day. There had been a sharp frost (not snow or ice, just frost) overnight and the roads were a bit slippy.

The main roads seemed littered with crashed cars, including one which had demolished a 18" x 18" sandstone gatepost. I saw maybe ten cars left abandoned in various damaged states ranging from panels written off all down one side to full write-off. All of them were new or nearly new, but according to the propaganda, they should all have been bangers. Clearly, something else had been at play rather than the age and mechanical condition of those cars.

I was never fully taken in by the ever-increasing control which happened during the 1960s and 1970s. Some of it was necessary, no doubt, but by some amazing coincidence, the total of it made running a car on a shoestring almost impossible. And it was hard not to conclude that this was an aim.