Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
A BRITISH COUNCIL employee is facing disciplinary action after reportedly insulting Prince George under a Facebook post that called him a “f***ing d***head”.
The Sun reported that Angela Gibbins insulted the three-year-old, saying he was “privileged, rich and living off public money”.
She reportedly wrote the following under a photo of the prince, who is third in line to the British throne: “White privilege. That cheeky grin is the innate knowledge he’s royal, rich, advantaged and will never know ANY difficulties or hardships in life.”
Gibbins is a manager at the British Council, which is partly taxpayer-funded and promotes UK culture globally.
In a statement today, the organisation said it “expects the highest standards of our staff” and, in accordance with their code of conduct, has “started disciplinary procedures with the individual concerned”.
This comment was made on a private social media account. It has absolutely no connection to the British Council and does not represent our views and values.
The council receives about £154.9 million (€185 million) in annual government funding.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Monorail
auto mated councillors be way to go
Is there a chance the track could bend?
No on your life my Hindu friend.
What about us brain-dead slobs?
I hear those things are awfully loud…
D’oh!
Lol shane
But dublin’s still all cracked and broken?
You’ll be given cushy jobs!
Sorry Colin, the mob has spoken.
@mark, I would say you’ll be given cushy jobs but seems that’s already the case with tram drivers…
The ring fell off my pudding can :(
Mono… D’oh!
Use my pen knife my good man! … We can do this
Well, sir, there’s nothing on earth like a genuine bona fide, electrified, six-car Monorail
They’ll all start striking again if it goes through then they will be forced to keep the drivers before any plans get off the ground.
ha ha ha ha ha ha
Waffler will be along soon to tell us how, capitalist pigs will exploit the robot workers and that AAA stands shoulder to shoulder with cyborg 1′s right to toilet breaks
Pffft, you’ll never get a computer program to push the apple forward slowly.
Brilliant idea.
Let the drivers found out what working really is.
DLR in London is also automated.
DLR is not an on street system. On street systems are very difficult to fully automate and probably very expensive.
The article does not mention on-street….
But the LUAS is an on street system.
Tesla , Google , Apple , ford and all the major car companies have the technology in cars. The Luas is in tracks and doesn’t need steering wheels, the lights work in unison with it. And a vast majority is off the road. The technology exists and the requirements for the Luas are even simpler
Rory every DLR has an emergency operator sitting at the front.
@Proinsias! Seen as driverless cars and trucks have been developed and road tested by Google and Samsung i doubt its ‘very’ difficult to automate the trams as the technoligy already exists. Seen as the luas drivers can cost upwards of 50k a year i would imagine dropping the drivers wpuld offset the cost nicely….
Nope.
I was on the DLR last week – sitting in the front seat – pretending to drive :) There was no emergency operator.
Just back from the euros and the tram/monorail is automatic. At a guess it’s at least 15 years old but amazingly effective. Any current and all future small intercity lines should be set up on this model. Drivers simply aren’t needed
Is it on street? Does it have to contend with the stupidity of Dublin drivers and pedestrians?
I’m living forward to when everything eventually become automated and the machines do eventually take over.
I’m still convinced that they’ll do a better job.
Since most of us operate like robots these days the transition should be bloodless.
Will Philips. Your right. Just ask your other half. She agrees
@ Will Philips. I fully agree. Along with your half. She’ll tell you machines are better..
Cheeky.
A lot of the luas drivers are also taxi drivers . I wonder will management give them the letter they need for the NTA to operate as a taxi after the strike. I see a lot of bus drivers are also taxi drivers. The baseball cap doesn’t completely hide your faces lads.
You’re a very observant man to be able to recognise so many drivers double jobbing. Are they taking your custom?
I am indeed. Are you a double jobber?
These days, who isn’t?!
I know it’s unpopular opinion, but that sucks for the drivers.
What does it cost these days to give a child a nice upbringing, ensure they have affordable healthcare, make sure they go to a good college, and make sure you aren’t working unsociable hours so you get to see them?
They went out and took a stand to receive a piece of the profit they helped to create, and now they are to be replaced by Robots.
When we all have technology that is able to do our jobs, will they give us more time off? More time to spend with loved ones?
Will they f**k
Yes but it isn’t because they went on strike that this is happening, rather the direction the world is moving in. They can retrain in something else if they don’t want this argument in 20 years time.
Yea but somebody’s got to build the robot that builds the robot that does the work, simple really.
Like when Charlie’s dad was replace by a robotic arm in the toothpaste factory but ended getting a job to fix the very same machine.
Tipp
Innovation is constantly replacing mundane ‘simple’ jobs performed by humans. There is no area that has not been impacted. The type of jobs people do just changes.
The “Luas” train in Dubai runs driverless and has done for the past 8 or nine years with no issues you get your ticket and hold it against the ticket machine and your in. Simple . Hasn’t been one ounce of trouble with it and no drivers strikes so it can be done , just not in Ireland .
The Dubai Tram is not driverless! Read the link:
The metro is driverless.
The metro does not operate on the streets. It is a strictly controlled environment where driverless operation is far simpler to implement.
Problem is ALL jobs can be automated. Apparently the technology exists to turn IPads into mobile MRI scanners! When big intellectuals like Stephen Hawking are expressing concern about AI and the growth of machines…it’s time to look up and think about where the world is going.
Yes I know but we’re heading down the road of driverless cars, that technology will be available for all transport. I’m pretty sure it’s a given.
Nick…its not just “mundane jobs” that are going. Survey after survey highlights “the professions” as being at the greatest risk from automation. Finance is one of the areas at freatest risk. Look at how few traders now work on wall street compareed to 20 yrs ago.
I think driverless cars are further in the future than you think. My guess is that even 10 years time is an optimistic timescale.
I’ll tell ya what it costs – working your way up through school over 14 yrs and achieving a decent leaving cert. Taking another 4 yrs to earn a degree or apprenticeship then possibly another 2 yrs to earn a masters or further training at the very least. It’s about working and constantly bettering yourself and your skills and abilities to make yourself more employable and higher skilled so you can achieve higher pay better conditions and a better lifestyle based on your merits and achievements. Not a 7 week course after which you expect to earn as much as people who save lives and keep the peace, people with vast amounts more training with much less pay, more risks and equally unsociable hours. Many who also don’t hold the population and economy of a city to ransom to get there way.
Well in my first comment I did give a random figure of 20 years. ;)
Don’t believe what the press tell you it’s lot more to it then 7months training. . Don’t blame them because your salary is low why don’t you and your fellow workers protest for better money.
They say we won’t need women in the future either….just think no more nagging.
Can they automate the executives first? If there are no drivers to drive, there’s no need for overpaid executives to pretend to make important decisions.
Pah they’d end up still sitting in the drivers seat as some kind of Automation Supervisor, no doubt with a hefty pay rise thrown in for the inconvenience of no longer having to push anything at all
They should automate the Dart.
Around these parts we call it the DOIRT.
Skytrain in Vancouver is all automated since the 1980s lol
Does the name give a clue that it doesn’t run on the road like the Luas?
I’m pretty sure they could program the teams to stop in the event something is on the track..they are called sensors…
Not that simple the balance between safe operation and speed is difficult to achieve.
Err on the safety will make operation very slow with the tram coming to a stop for something like a pigeon on the line. Err on the other side and the LUAS runs over a little old lady.
Automated rail systems only have one possible route and limited areas of tram /vehicle/ pedestrian interaction. It runs in a rail bed that can fitted out with sensors and triggers and all sorts of monitoring gear to relay telemetry to aid decision making. It doesn’t need to consider the myriad of other factors that a car would and autonomous cars are around the corner. While it would mean extensive retrofitting of the system most likely it would be a one off cost offset against the redundancy packages and pay and benefits of drivers over time. Entirely achievable and only a matter of time before the cost outlay matches the wage bill and someone makes the decision.
DLR is a very different animal to a tram system sharing streets with some of the most dumbass drivers and pedestrians on earth!
And so it begins ,skynet
Skynet begins with the automation of a light rail system in Dublin?.. Well that’s a bit of a let down… was expecting something a little more.. well.. whizz bangier…
Gotta start somewhere paddy :):)
Not with a whizz bang but with a “mind the gap”…… Possibly an “I told you to mind the f-ing gap” as someone is dragged down a tramline trapped in a sliding door!
I for one welcome our new robot overlords
its just common sense, lets hope it happens as soon as possible :)
Hopefully just after your job is automated.
Rumour has it drivers will refuse to train the robots
We need those Johnny Cabs from Total Recall. Problem solved.
Lets hope The redundant driver doesn’t go after your job.
Some chance benny. Qualifications, eh i push an apple and you may of heard about me and me driver mates tryin to shaft the company. Thank you, we will be in touch mr luasdriver.
Benny
There’s not too many jobs pushing apples to go after. They may have to retrain
Benny maybe the drivers should look at doing automation courses, they may be surprised what doors actual qualifications open
Wouldn’t matter if they’re fully automated, they’re on street light rail so they would require someone to man the drivers seat in case of emergencies ie if a car broke a red light or people walked out in front of it. The DLR in London is fully automated because it doesn’t share the road. The central line is too and it still uses drivers
Sensors come into play, like on driverless cars. And the Central Line has very dated rolling stock and infrastructure.
Darragh, they’d have plenty of sensors with built in redundancy. There won’t be a problem you should look up how self driving cars work.
The sensors are better than a drivers eyes as they don’t need light and react better
Driverless trains are, even on the London underground. Driverless cars will everywhere soon, too. Airplanes really fly themselves also, with the crew there to step in for emergencies. Nobody flys the lethal bombers either, now known as drones.
Lausanne and Trikala?
Ger
Dones are not automated. They are flown by pilots. The only difference is the pilots do not need to be on the aircraft, they are sitting in a remote cockpit but still flying them.
Some drones are completely autonomous. With decisions to bomb made by the software.
Ger
I don’t believe that for a second. Have you a reference?
It’s true – drones are often programmed to complete missions. Eye in the Sky, a new movie (Helen Mirren) about autonomous drones showed how it’s done – but there’s a lot about this new technology on google.
Amazing technology. When the drone’s scan shows up napalm, explosives or large heroin quantities for example – it’s programmed to destroy, without authorisation or communication.
Ger
Can you provide and example?
Nick – the internet is full of them. Google is your friend, that is – if you don’t live on Skeillig or somewhere. Where have you been – not Area 51?
Nick, you seem surprised! There are also submarine drones, that only surface every few years – but can be deployed in any ocean, at any depth. With nuclear weaponry: These are not autonomous.
Wow Ger that was a great book you were reading, Asimov was it? Yes drones can fly on autopilot to a specific area but the kill chain is controlled by humans. Humans pull the trigger. Humans pick the targets. Yes I’ve seen that movie and do you honestly believe everything you see in movies? Do you think that yer man’s phone controlled flying bug camera actually exists? And if it does why would they need a dude to be within sight of the place to control it? Also submarines, yes can potentially stay submerged for years but the crew would be long dead from starvation before that so what would be the point? Also how can they be drones if they are not autonomous? Surely that’s just a submarine then?
Drone submarines have no crew! Those drones seeking drugs, explosives and specific targets – are activated internally.
Ger
If the Internet is full of them could you provide one single example as I can’t find any
It still takes a person to programme a drone. Self programming drones would be a dangerous thing.
Correct Daisy – humans program.
But Ger is correct.
Drones – in the air and under the sea – don’t need (but usually have) human control.
And if Nick can’t see evidence of this on the web, she should never apply for a drone pilot job!
Good enough for the apple pushers!
This joker should stay in medicine. No workers means no taxes so Paddy were do you think your wages from St James Hospital comes from. I sometimes despair at the mentality of people in this country.
Thomas there will be plenty of highly skilled automation engineers. Your argument is flawed.
And what if the automation engineers go on strike?
My directorship on the board of St James’ is unpaid. And before you ask, I claim no expenses for it.
As you can drive on some areas of the luas track what would happen if a vehicle stalled and couldn’t move , or someone lost there footing and fell on to the track . how would the tram be stopped? It is not normal working conditions that would cause problems if trams were automated but abnormal ones
Linda
Do you honestly think that those scenarios have not or would not be considered. I would hazard a guess that the use of sensors and cameras with people and machines remotely managing the system may be used.
The tram would be stopped by applying the brake
Only a FG dirtbag would come up with this and only because there are enough dirtbags to support him
SF have the majority in Dublin city and passed the motion
I don’t think fully driverless on street tram operation has been implemented anywhere as it is technically complex and I suspect very costly.
In the long run it would be cheeper and easier than using human drivers.
-Never gets tired.
-Never calls in sick.
-Never needs a holiday.
-Never goes on strike and demand more pay.
-Plus it can always be upgraded with newer and better software.
a sad attempt at humour, or sarcasm…?
@will and no one to ride on them either as no one will be working, cop on and get a brain
Luddites
-a member of any of the bands of English workers who destroyed machinery, especially in cotton and woollen mills, which they believed was threatening their jobs (1811–16).
Technology makes old jobs obsolete but at the same times creates far more new jobs in different sectors that never existed beforehand.
The industrial revolution and age of modern science of the 20th century created far more employment than it destroyed.
Read a history book dipsh*t.
Will, when was your job automated?
Automation of Luas is inevitable. Of course there’ll be job losses. It’s tough but that’s the reality.
Can some of the greedy tram drivers comment to give their views on how their greed has now cost the country jobs, also I don’t think I heard any comment from then to justify there demands that there paid more than new nurses, engineers, managers etc etc.
Ladies and Gentlemen, this is your automatic driver, a sophisticated computer. I tell this tram when to accelerate, when to slow down, when to stop and when to start. With a precision of which no human operator is capable. We are now going a little too fast and there is a curve ahead, so I shall instruct the tram to slow down, down, down, down, down, down, down …
The counciller is only seeking popular opinion he knows it to expensive to get that kind of technology the strike is over why would he want to rob people of their jobs .i would suggest that the councilors be made redundant they haven’t any power the city manager as the final say on any decisions.They are only parasites drawning ahefty salary and expenses and that’s probably only a sideline to them
That’s the solution ……. Automate the Council ……. just need a brown envelope slot and away they go!
Well said Thomas
Great. So now we will have to pay the apple pushers a grand a week fir staying at home???
have your say