Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

London's 850-year-old food markets to close

bbc.co.uk

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

171–180 of 300 posts

Re: London's 850-year-old food markets to close

#171

Post by rvense »

dghf wrote: post #129
jayelbe wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Mayor of London doesn't have any power over the City of London Corporation. They are completely separate authorities. The Corporation is essentially a unitary/borough-tier local authority, overseeing the "square mile" centre of the city, and has a council of elected councilmen. It provides housing, education, social services, street cleaning, markets etc for a small area of central London, and has existed since t…

Fun fact, the City of London is the last local authority in the UK where businesses as well residents get to vote. Businesses can appoint one voter for every five employees up to 50, and then one per 50 employees after that.

Do you know how that adds up, what the ratio of business votes to residential votes is? I imagine many more people work in the city than live there.

Re: London's 850-year-old food markets to close

#172

Post by blibble »

rvense wrote: post #171
dghf wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fun fact, the City of London is the last local authority in the UK where businesses as well residents get to vote. Businesses can appoint one voter for every five employees up to 50, and then one per 50 employees after that.

Do you know how that adds up, what the ratio of business votes to residential votes is? I imagine many more people work in the city than live there.

there are more business votes, but practically very few people actually use their business vote

as a business voter I went to my ward's annual meeting (wardmote), they were surprised to see a non-resident there

nearly the entire thing was about issues residents care about (late noise, cycle paths, petty crime, etc)

that and their amazing new plans for billingsgate/smithfield

the other are a couple of other things to remember about City ward lists:

    1. employers have no involvement other than picking their voters -- it's up to the individuals
    2. due to the allocation rules: micro-businesses have most of the votes, so small food vendors have significantly more votes than all the large businesses

Re: London's 850-year-old food markets to close

#173

Post by tomcam »

hnbear wrote: post #24

Statement from the City of London Corporation which is closing them down: > Chris Hayward, policy chairman of the City of London Corporation, said the > decision represented a "positive new chapter" for the markets as it "empowers > traders to build a sustainable future in premises that align with their > long-term business goals". This is a great statement. Like firing people to free them up to find jobs that better…

We had to destroy the village to save it https://www.thisdayinquotes.com/2015/02/it-became-necessary-...

Re: London's 850-year-old food markets to close

#174

Post by sosborn »

smartbit wrote: post #70
hardlianotion wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who doesn’t love corporate bullshit?

I love the journalist who puts these quotes at the end of the article. Great journalism.

Journalists take glee in letting the fools expose themselves.

Re: London's 850-year-old food markets to close

#175

Post by DrBazza »

The Corporation of London own the land Billingsgate is on. They've been looking to redevelop this for over a decade since the land's value is now magnitudes more than when it was built because of Canary Wharf and the new Canary Wharf Crossrail station.

It's prime real estate land, possibly the best plot in London right now. And so is Smithfield, or at least the land that Museum of London is on, and they're moving to Smithfield. For a while I expect.

The whole thing is just short term profiteering over tradition and a rich history. Some things need preserving.

Re: London's 850-year-old food markets to close

#177

Post by golemiprague »

DrBazza wrote: post #175

The Corporation of London own the land Billingsgate is on. They've been looking to redevelop this for over a decade since the land's value is now magnitudes more than when it was built because of Canary Wharf and the new Canary Wharf Crossrail station. It's prime real estate land, possibly the best plot in London right now. And so is Smithfield, or at least the land that Museum of London is on, and they're moving to…

[dead]

Re: London's 850-year-old food markets to close

#178

Post by helsinkiandrew »

It’s sad for the traders being evicted but the fact is that these markets have been dwindling in importance for decades. Restaurants and shops don’t get up before dawn to go to market to see what’s fresh, they order from wholesalers online or direct from the farms and get food delivered (often with fresh veg from the same supplier)

Smithfield’s in particular is better as a new home for the London museum and probably more office/retail buildings than a poorly located commercial meat market

Re: London's 850-year-old food markets to close

#179

Post by slibhb »

DrBazza wrote: post #175

The Corporation of London own the land Billingsgate is on. They've been looking to redevelop this for over a decade since the land's value is now magnitudes more than when it was built because of Canary Wharf and the new Canary Wharf Crossrail station. It's prime real estate land, possibly the best plot in London right now. And so is Smithfield, or at least the land that Museum of London is on, and they're moving to…

> The whole thing is just short term profiteering over tradition and a rich history. Some things need preserving.

Some things do. But is this one of them? The article doesn't make a great case.

And building something new here won't necessarily be short-term.

Re: London's 850-year-old food markets to close

#180

Post by Der_Einzige »

hnbear wrote: post #24

Statement from the City of London Corporation which is closing them down: > Chris Hayward, policy chairman of the City of London Corporation, said the > decision represented a "positive new chapter" for the markets as it "empowers > traders to build a sustainable future in premises that align with their > long-term business goals". This is a great statement. Like firing people to free them up to find jobs that better…

The reality is that almost no one makes any good money in the food industry. For a lot of people in that industry, if they tried to find jobs that better aligned with their skills (except in food), they'd likely be better off. A lot of people take jobs in terrible places and get complacent, maybe far too complacent.

A healthy economy is one where money, people, skills, and intellectual property has high velocity, meaning people quickly reorient their productive capacity to where it's most useful.

Well, this would all be true if the UK wasn't going through a lost generation economically. Serves them right for Brexit!

Post reply on HN