Term-time holidays

I only ever went to a farmhouse with no electricity in North Wales for my family holidays so my bitterness and jealousy is deep rooted.:rage:

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You were lucky

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We used to dream of a farmhouse.

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We used to dream of a hole in the ground covered by a tarpaulin.

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I reckon if we got our shit together then the planet could support an even greater population.

https://cleantechnica.com/2011/12/14/solar-energy-from-the-sahara-desert-could-power-the-world-but-will-it/

As always, science fiction has been there first, but the world would be a fucking shit place without kids. They are, at very least, a very effective arsehole-buffer- often stopping even the most ardent arsehole from being overly and unnecessarily serious.

At the (young) stage mine are at they often remind you that we are just another kind of animal. Feral little shits :wink:

Stopping humans from being too serious and stopping us being too full of ourselves

My son sneezed at breakfast and headbutted the table, full force. Fucking hilarious. That justified everything heā€™ll ever cost me right there, including the easter- holiday priced hotel we were staying in.

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Not sure I really agree with this.
Due to our planetā€™s axis of rotation being tilted at an angle of 23.5 degrees relative to our orbital plane itā€™s always summer somewhere in the world so why isnā€™t demand constant?

The higher prices at school holiday times are manufactured to extract the most money from people. Just take a look at holiday prices & how they rise at every school holiday time not just UK summer months.

Curious how the day after term time starts (At any time of the year) the prices plummet.

Honestly, itā€™s not a tax. Itā€™s a cost, like the cost of buying them food and clothing and Lego and car insurance and solicitorā€™s fees. Stuff for kids is often more expensive than stuff for adults. Sometimes itā€™s unreasonable (jeeeez, the profit margin on strollers must make Michelin starred chefs envious !). But in the case of holidays itā€™s actually reasonable, at least from the sellersā€™ point of view, none of whom is making a vast profit. Itā€™s exactly the same as rush-hour vs off-peak railway tickets (where the margin is a great deal more than 50% - Didcot to Paddington return is Ā£62.40 in the rush hour, Ā£25.70 off-peak). People accept that that is reasonable. Why not the same for off-peak holidays ? Some peopleā€™s work prevents them from travelling off-peak. Some people have kids which, for the good of education, prevents them from holidaying outside the holidays.

VB

Iā€™m saying holiday prices rise at times of high demand. Are you saying school holiday times are not times of high demand ?

VB

Mr Platt said ā€¦ ā€œYou are not the final arbiter of whatā€™s right for your child.ā€

A common theme in regulationā€¦maybe parents could be if it werenā€™t for fannies like him.

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Is it reasonable to be taken to court for only traveling at peek time?

We arenā€™t going on our annual holiday to Cornwall with friends and their families this year, or indeed ever again because of these rules.

A group of us for the last 17 years, in the middle of June have been booking a 500 year old cliff top house, part of an estate 2 miles off a proper road in the middle of nowhere. Our children have been going since before they went to school and up until now we have been able to take them but this year we donā€™t feel we can. The headmaster has changed and the new one doesnā€™t approve. This means that because we canā€™t go, there are not enough people to make the booking worthwhile and we have had to give it up.

We have tried for years to shift the week to the school holidays but the place is so idyllic that it is impossible, as people never give their slot up. Really terribleā€¦ All of our children have grown up going there and have really benefited from spending the week with a bunch of adults, hanging out and doing very little - we have all said at different times how much they have grown when there. It is really sad that none of us will go again to what has been a really important and much loved part of our year. :frowning2:

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Do employers have to offer flexible working because peak travel is more expensive?

Haha but itā€™s the school holiday system that makes the demand so high! Allow the kids a week or two off at other times & the high demand at ā€œSchool holidayā€ time doesnā€™t exist & holiday prices can become a more constant price.

A case of the tail wagging the dog!

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Mr MWS Freudian slip right there. :slight_smile:

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ā€¦ aaaaand weā€™re right back to 1880 again. Which is when the state said ā€œYour child needs to know how to read and write and countā€ and the parents replied ā€œIā€™ll be the judge of that - donā€™t you know there are turnips to be dug ?ā€. The state took away parentsā€™ rights over whether to educate their children or not 137 years ago. Good heavens, Iā€™m staggered that there are people who havenā€™t noticed that yet. (In case itā€™s news to anyone, you canā€™t sell them into slavery, beat them within an inch of their lives, marry them to whoever you like or have the boys castrated for choral purposes any longer either.)

VB

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Yes. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. The school holiday dates are the problem. (For the avoidance of doubt, Iā€™m not being ironic, I absolutely believe this.) There is a smallish group of people who have a different problem which is much more tricky to solve. They are the parents who must, for whatever reason, work in the school holidays. Thatā€™s a tough one.

VB

Fucking hell, itā€™s a sixty quid fine, them that can afford a couple of grand while saving themselves a grand are still going to bloody well go. It is, as always, the poor and those that work during the school holidays that will be fuckedā€¦

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