That’s good to hear. I guess it would largely depend on circumstances rather than age.
I’m guessing you aren’t planning to enter drawdown anytime soon?
Not that late 50s or even early 60s is old, of course. I didn’t mean to suggest you had reached your financial sell-by date 
I’ll put down my spade now.
That’s not applicable in my case. I have two private pensions and have never had a SIPP. When I took early retirement I had the option to choose (from the total value of each pension) either maximum pension and minimum lump sum, vice versa, or anything in between. I chose to take minimum pension and maximum lump sum so that I’d have plenty to invest for additional income until I reach state pension age.
Once I start receiving the state pension then I’ll rethink how I save/invest.
Bit late to the party but my council finally decided to tell us our increase.
Should be about £16 extra a month. Not the end of the world but still…
Interestingly we got a leaflet from the council Mayor saying the average increase was £2.40 for the borough; which shows just how few people pay the higher bands of tax.
Still not had ours yet, I even keep checking my online account in case my letter is delayed
I don’t look at my investments too often. They’re all long term and I just have confidence (faith!) that over a 10-20 year plus horizon I’ll be quids in.
I’ve probably taken a decent hit over the last few days, but you gotta take the rough with the smooth.
What an absolute f-ing mess.
Thames should never have been allowed to make the dividend payments it did whilst is also failed to invest in infrastructure for almost 15 years. Now it’s £19bn in debt and laden with fines.
It can be nationalised but we’d essentially be taking on £19bn of private debt into the public purse. It can be kept private but unless it gets a tonne of tax breaks along with price hikes it will flat out run out of funding.
I feel like it should just be allowed to go bankrupt and then the state can set up a new company to buy the infrastructure from the administrators at a low cost and without the debt, but that will never happen.
@breville_monkey it’s Thames Water day in court today for the verdict to keep the 3bn lifeline.
Unfortunately the regulator has made it clear they side with Thames Water.
I don’t see it being overturned but I really hope they do and it can naturally go pop and go into gov control rather than chucking money at the current business or giving them a huge payout to take over.
Edit
Dismissed unfortunately 
On a semi related note. Don’t know if anyone watches audit vids from DJ, Pure, DJE etc but just noticed that today’s is Yorkshire water.
Looks a load of 
Would be interesting to see how the billions they have are being spent or being not spent.
What do the police and fire authority charges pay for that central government don’t?
Just thought I’d ask Claude to see what AI thought 
The government could theoretically account for varying local needs through its central funding formula. They already do this to some extent with the main police and fire grants.
It’s primarily about creating a governance structure where local authorities have some genuine budget control and accountability, rather than purely acting as administrators of centrally-determined funding. The council tax element gives them that “skin in the game” with a direct relationship to local taxpayers.
Whether this mixed approach is better than full central funding is debatable - it creates more local control but also results in funding disparities between wealthier and poorer areas that central government grants try to balance out.
I’ve said this before to me I would love to see it all central managed.
Even if it meant personally instead of giving the council £2500 a year its
£250 council
And based on my personal income:
£2,250 to the Gov
The council just can then focus on actual local services which currently appear to get the dregs ~2% of the total council tax.
Going to write to my local MP as I’m not liking how the current system is compounding. I don’t want to be chucking in
£2625 next year
£2755 in 2027
£2893 in 2028
£3037 in 2029
And I’m paying £3k+ and the situation is still a show.
I can’t believe i missed this news last week. I’m not sure what to make of it but we live near a couple of pylons so should be eligible
A government survey in 2024, external suggested 78% of people would find an energy infrastructure project more acceptable if they were offered discounts on their bills.
Bribing people with discounts paid via other customers, so they are more compliant with fing up the landscape.
I’m well within 500 metres of a pylon but it’s been there years 
New pylons only, it seems.
What would be the alternative? Micro nuclear reactors in every neighbourhood; and Sally can swap out the spent plutonium after the school run?
Thank you for your service.
They can bury the cables.
It’s more inconvenient to do that. Instead of spending money doing that they are paying off nearby residents for destroying the landscape.
If you look at the details this is really about the connection of East Anglia to off shore wind farms. The route they have chosen is just messing up the landscape from Norwich towards London.
Funny you should say that was at Oxford Brookes the other week at the open Science talking to the Oxford Fusion team.
So you sorry yes you are correct here but their aim was 2050 and to have local fusion eventually.
