Housing supply and planning delay in the South of England

There is growing international interest in the impact of regulatory controls on the supply of housing The UK has a particularly restrictive planning regime and a detailed and uncertain process of development control linked to it. This paper presents the findings of empirical research on the time taken to gain planning permission for selected recent major housing projects from a sample of local authorities in southern England. The scale of delay found was far greater than is indicated by average official data measuring the extent to which local authorities meet planning delay targets. If these results are representative of the country as a whole, they indicate that planning delay could be a major cause of the slow responsiveness of British housing supply

Orbital Deflection of Comets by Directed Energy

Cometary impacts pose a long-term hazard to life on Earth. Impact mitigation techniques have been studied extensively, but they tend to focus on asteroid diversion. Typical asteroid interdiction schemes involve spacecraft physically intercepting the target, a task feasible only for targets identified decades in advance and in a narrow range of orbits---criteria unlikely to be satisfied by a threatening comet. Comets, however, are naturally perturbed from purely gravitational trajectories through solar heating of their surfaces which activates sublimation-driven jets. Artificial heating of a comet, such as by a laser, may supplement natural heating by the Sun to purposefully manipulate its path and thereby avoid an impact. Deflection effectiveness depends on the comet's heating response, which varies dramatically depending on factors including nucleus size, orbit and dynamical history. These factors are incorporated into a numerical orbital model to assess the effectiveness and feasibility of using high-powered laser arrays in Earth orbit and on the ground for comet deflection. Simulation results suggest that a diffraction-limited 500 m orbital or terrestrial laser array operating at 10 GW for 1% of each day over 1 yr is sufficient to fully avert the impact of a typical 500 m diameter comet with primary nongravitational parameter A1 = 2 x 10^-8 au d^-2. Strategies to avoid comet fragmentation during deflection are also discussed.Comment: 13 pages, 12 figures; AJ, in pres

Re-Building Confidence as a Prelude to Ministry

In order for the churches to exercise ministry in Australia, there must be confidence in them. While confidence in a range of systems and organisations has been falling over recent decades, in 2018 just 11 per cent of the adult population indicated a great deal or complete confidence in the churches and religious organisations, having fallen from 22 per cent in 2009. Analysis of data from the Australian Survey of Social Attitudes (2018) identified some factors which contributed to this low level of confidence, including the following: Most Australians feel that religious organisations are too powerful. They also feel that religious organisations have contributed more to violence than to peace. Many are concerned that religious organisations are a barrier to gender equity and that religious people are too intolerant. Many reject the “knowledge” on which the churches are based, including the idea of God. Building public confidence will need to address these issues of the perception of power, building the perceptions that the churches are contributing to peace, that they treat women and men equally, and that they are tolerant. It also means addressing its “knowledge base”, helping people to understand the meaningfulness of the concept of God