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> socialist aspects of the UK I think you're thinking of the other UK, the imaginary one that right-wing commentators make out to be a hellish nightmare of bad
by altacc 7y ago
> socialist aspects of the UK
I think you're thinking of the other UK, the imaginary one that right-wing commentators make out to be a hellish nightmare of bad teeth inflicted upon the populace by fiendishly free health care. Instead of the real UK, with it's right-wing, capitalist, free-market friendly, populist government.
Building regulations aren't in any way socialist, they are pretty much global and many countries, including the "freedom" loving USA, have extensive government-mandated building codes which include height restrictions or mechanisms to limit height.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- eru 7y agoYou are right that building codes aren't a sign of socialism at all. The UK however has a pretty interventionist state. (But yes, they are less interventionist than eg the French. Low bar, though.) And eg re-nationalising the railways is perennial popular with the population. Luckily, no government has been crazy enough to do it, nor has it even featured much in election campaigns.
- tomatocracy 7y agoNot sure that's right re railways. Railtrack was de facto renationalised by the Blair government (becoming Network Rail) in the early 2000s, and we had an election one month ago where the main opposition party campaigned on a promise to not relet the private sector passenger franchises, ie de facto take them back into public ownership at the end of their terms. That isn't quite all of the railways (you've still got a few privately owned pieces of infrastructure, freight operators and rolling stock leasing) but it's pretty close.
- eru 7y agoInteresting, thanks! Please imagine I added the appropriate hedge words in my comment above. With your corrections, it does move Britain a bit more into the interventionist state direction.