Dear George

[pcstru]

I am genuinely not sure if you are trolling or not. Everyday I look online for jobs within a 100 mile radius of my house...everyday atleast 200 jobs come fresh on those sites (includes jobseekers site, monster, jobsite etc). The jobs range from retail to office worker to constuction and everything else.

200 jobs a day would be 50,000 a year and 100 mile radius in the UK covers a lot of country and in the SE, probably a huge chunk of the UK population. What you don't see from those stats is the job losses, but given rising unemployment of the last few years and given that the majority of people out of work actually want to be in work, you can reasonably assume more jobs are being lost than are being created.

Wages are marginally better than the benefits I admit but take into account the fact that you get working tax credits to a point which boosts the income and you are once again better off than on benefits. Higher wages will come as more people are in work, therefore spending more, thereford boosting economy, which boosts profit margins and therefore wage increases...usual cycle.

When I say the "margins" I mean that somewhere in the set of circumstances some will find themselves in where taking on a job means a cut in income. This is just what happens in large systems. Higher wages don't generally come in an economy in recession.

 

You might think I am being niave or whatever, but I'm not. Look globally at various economies. Denmark and Germany are good examples. Cutting benefits got people acrively looking for employment, therefore increasing economy and average wages went up within 3 years by almost 15%.

 

Do you have some references for that?

[Guest Guest]

I didn't do a now and then comparison. I just cited some figures which give a sense of the number of long term (>5 years) unemployed. IMO figures are better than anecdote but I can sympathise with why you might not like to deal with actual numbers.

 

Apologies, I had read that CH4 article, who's main line is the comparison, that many times I forgot to re-read your post. Like I'm trying to say though it's not 5000, or 50,000. Those figures only apply to JSA benefits. There are 1m people who claim benefits but are not on JSA. Obviously a lot will be on incapacity or disability benefits but these 1m people are also where the single mums on income support live. You can claim income support (ie not JSA) until your youngest child is 5 (used to be 7) before you get dropped of onto JSA. It's quite easy to see how that sort of person could be on income support for much longer than the 5 years we are currently talking about.

 

I'd love to talk numbers but I've yet to see a source which gives meaningful ones ie figures of all benefits and not just the one the government doctored to fool us all. Also the number of people who are forced to take a job under the terms of their JSA agreement but then go on to get sacked in short order - these people also don't fall into the 5000 or 50000. I have no idea of how many people that will be but that also seems like a good way to hide the true figure.

[featured_spectre]

PCSTRU, I believe my mum still has the Der Speigl magazine that it was in. I will ring and ask later

 

*edit*

 

and btw, that was a mistype on my phone, its not 100 miles, I actually meant 10 miles. Granted some jobs are repeated over the various sites, so we can say that accounts for 50% optimistically, That is still 100 jobs within a 10 mile radius of my house, per day. Not a wide area, but the area NEEDS workers. It covers everything from cleaners, to labourers, to Network Analysts, to carpenters, to retail.

 

100 jobs per day, is 700 jobs in a week, or 36'400 per year, in an area with close to half a million working age people in a 10 mile radius, that's a small chunk of jobs for a large number of people.

Edited January 28, 2013 by featured_spectre

[Gatt]

This thread is the very reason I'd never become a politician...

 

You screw up and you get slated for it in threads like this, you do well - no bugger gives a damn about you...

 

Gordon B did what he thought was the right thing to do = got it horribly wrong, people boo and throw rotten tomatoes at him.

George R comes in, comes up with a plan to try and repair the damage created by Mr Brown, he make a few mistakes (aka a few decisions that people don't like - such as child tax cuts for the rich? Restricting benefits for the lazy people who cannot be bothered to get up off their hiney's and away from their 40"+ Plasma TV and XBoxes, etc) and gets a rougher deal the the chap who pretty much got us in this mess in the first place!

 

Yes, things are tough right now, shops are closing, growth is still dropping. but we are still far better off than some of the other countries (Greece anyone?).

 

Now, imagine the scenario above, but replace Gordon with George and George with Gordon and I doubt it would have been any different - we would STILL be where we are now - on the verge of another recession..

 

It doesn't matter who is in power - the result would have been the same...

[Earthling]

I have to say I do enjoy lighting the blue touch paper.......

 

Wind 'em up and watch 'em go.

 

[aerospacemango]

And, @aerospacemango - I am middle class and I don't get "hot-under-the-collar" about such things - but then, I'm not a Daily Mail reader. Please don't tar all the middle classes with the same brush.

 

Aaaaannnnddd...back in the room!

 

My apologies @witch , as I have no intention of tarring anyone.

 

However, on such an emotive subject as this, there are always going to be some sweeping generalisations that slip through the net!

 

For instance: All people on benefits are scroungers and work-shy. My wife works for the DWP and although a fair number do seem to spend their lives going from Jobcentre to pub to bookies etc, there are more that WANT to be in work. The problem is that this country has been turned from manufacturing to services. And some people believe that they are TOO GOOD to do those kind of jobs. This is why the immigrants were so successful. They have no qualms about doing ANY job which allows them to send money home to their family. I KNOW this to be true as I have had these conversations before.

[andyturpie]

I should say as above sometimes my opinions come across as a little extreme or hard faced to some. Being brought up in 1980s Leith in Edinburgh, I have witnessed first hand heroin addicts, people dying from HIV/AIDS (was the world capital of the disease at the time), mothers of school friends turning to prostitution, losing close friends to overdosing, being slashed through gang culture (by a former foe who later became my best friend). The person responsible for resisting and pulling away from that dark lifestyle (which could have been so easy to go down further) was myself and down to no one else. People have wondered why nothing phases me. What I have witnessed and what I have been through has toughened me up and now live with a "Don't moan about it, if your unhappy then sort it out" attitude.

[LeMarchand]

George was wibbling on about the High Speed Train on the breakfast news this morning, and said that "if the Victorians hadn't built the railways where would we be?" - I was under the impression that the railways were originally built by private consortiums, not the government. Does he really not see anything wrong with spending £30 billion on a rail line (with, one suspects, most of the work being farmed off abroad and/or to party supporters) and then letting his mates cream off any profit?

[localzuk]

George was wibbling on about the High Speed Train on the breakfast news this morning, and said that "if the Victorians hadn't built the railways where would we be?" - I was under the impression that the railways were originally built by private consortiums, not the government. Does he really not see anything wrong with spending £30 billion on a rail line (with, one suspects, most of the work being farmed off abroad and/or to party supporters) and then letting his mates cream off any profit?

 

Is the new line fully funded by govt, or is it PFI?

[aerospacemango]

I should say as above sometimes my opinions come across as a little extreme or hard faced to some. Being brought up in 1980s Leith in Edinburgh, I have witnessed first hand heroin addicts, people dying from HIV/AIDS (was the world capital of the disease at the time), mothers of school friends turning to prostitution, losing close friends to overdosing, being slashed through gang culture (by a former foe who later became my best friend). The person responsible for resisting and pulling away from that dark lifestyle (which could have been so easy to go down further) was myself and down to no one else. People have wondered why nothing phases me. What I have witnessed and what I have been through has toughened me up and now live with a "Don't moan about it, if your unhappy then sort it out" attitude.

 

But this is a major problem...and I accept the size of it....People no longer seem to have that attitude. It's ALL "gimme gimme gimme" and that has, to an extent, been built by the welfare culture. But this only came about because of the destruction of the manufacturing base by the Thatcher years. The massive loss of jobs in the 80's has made this country what it now is.

[andyturpie]

I think where some of the problem lies is that the younger generation (20s to 30s) who didn't experience the pre poll tax demo era, have to a certain extent have lived privilaged lives (even those who are class themselves as poor). Every home now has modern technology, hardly anyone walks anywhere (a lot are too proud to use public transport) and everything has been designed for convienience (or as I read it, laziness). The majority who saw through the hard times of the 70s and 80s where actually shoulder to shoulder with people who were brought up through the likes of WW2 who were continuously there to put things into perspective.

 

People today seem to stuggle with self autonomy and responsibility, which is a shame.

[Gibbo]

Spot on. Poverty these days is not owning an xbox360 or PS3!

[Flatpackhamster]

But you have to ask yourself "what did the Labour party inherit from the Tories in 1997?"

 

A stable, growing economy, migration under control, and no British army in Afghanistan or Iraq.

 

Oh, and more gold.

 

Oh, and much lower debt.

 

Oh, and house prices which were under control.

 

Oh, and private sector pensions.

 

So yes, what have the Tories ever done for us, eh?

 

there are MANY things that I could cite, just like you do about the Labour government. (the ERM fiasco, privatisation, taxation etc etc etc). This is always the case whatever government is in and as you know, the banking crisis was NOT caused by the Labour government.

 

That's a point of view, certainly. I disagree. It was Gordon Brown who agreed with the Americans that it was time to scrap the rules (I forget their name) which kept investment banking and retail banking separate. It was Gordon Brown who removed banking oversight from the Bank of England and handed it to the Financial Services Authority, which he then proceeded to stuff with his cronies. It was Gordon Brown who handed management of interest rates to the Bank of England's MPC, which he then proceeded to stuff with his cronies.

 

The MPC kept interest rates too low, which fuelled the credit bubble. The FSA failed to control the investment banks, and the scrapping of the separation rules meant that the investment banks could gamble with our savings.

 

As a consequence of these three decisions - all made by the Labour government - we, and our children and grandchildren, are in so much debt it will ruin the country for decades.

 

The fact is that Osborne has said on several occasions that things WILL be better by...whenever, and it isnt, may be why people just don't believe the coalition in any way, shape or form.

It is easy to blame the previous government - they all do it - but when the current government have said that what they are doing will solve things, and there is no sign of that - you have to wonder what is going on.

 

That's easy. They're idiots. Osborne and Cameron are no different to Brown or Blair.

 

Don't worry. In 2 years Cameron will be gone and a new, Thatcherite leader will replace him. Blessed be.

[aerospacemango]

Don't worry. In 2 years Cameron will be gone and a new, Thatcherite leader will replace him. Blessed be.

 

Whoop whoop! Hell YEAH!!!

 

That way, we can have the rest of the manufacturing sector destroyed and even MORE people claiming benefits. Maybe, just maybe, that NEXT Thatcherite government will make noises about not caring too much about the Falklands, and let the Argies re-invade....Only this time, we may not have the capacity to take them back. Let's go back to those heady days of the 80's where the rich got richer and the poor were marginalised....Oh wait....sounds like 2013!

 

 

*Many apologies to those whose sarcasm meter has just gone off the scale!*

[Flatpackhamster]

Whoop whoop! Hell YEAH!!!

That way, we can have the rest of the manufacturing sector destroyed and even MORE people claiming benefits. Maybe, just maybe, that NEXT Thatcherite government will make noises about not caring too much about the Falklands, and let the Argies re-invade....Only this time, we may not have the capacity to take them back. Let's go back to those heady days of the 80's where the rich got richer and the poor were marginalised....Oh wait....sounds like 2013!

 

*Many apologies to those whose sarcasm meter has just gone off the scale!*

 

Taxi for Dave Spart. Taxi for Dave Spart.

[aerospacemango]

Taxi for Dave Spart. Taxi for Dave Spart.

 

Hmmmmm.... 7 pages in and the name-calling starts. So, because I have firm beliefs you would label me as a "left-wing activist"?

 

Sad, because you normally put together a decent argument....

[Flatpackhamster]

Hmmmmm.... 7 pages in and the name-calling starts. So, because I have firm beliefs you would label me as a "left-wing activist"?

 

Sad, because you normally put together a decent argument....

 

I didn't see much point taking apart a post that was entirely based in hyperbole.

[LeMarchand]

Let's go back to those heady days of the 80's where the rich got richer and the poor were marginalised....Oh wait....sounds like 2013!

 

Except that in the 80's I actually liked some of the music they played on the radio.

Edited January 29, 2013 by LeMarchand
Typo

[aerospacemango]

Except that in the 80's I actually like some of the music they played on the radio.

 

The best decade musically! (Can you tell I grew up with all that?? LOL!!)

 

I didn't see much point taking apart a post that was entirely based in hyperbole.

 

Once again, I feel you've let yourself down. It is lazy to make a statement like that and not back up your words with some kind of argument against the points made. Hyperbole? Perhaps, in the first line, but the rest is up for discussion as a point on our recent history.

 

The 80's may well go down in history as the decade where society became fractured beyond repair. But that is a discussion we've had elsewhere.....Right-to-Buy, Strikes, etc etc etc....

 

But, as pointed out before....It WAS definitely the decade for music!

[Earthling]

As someone who remembers the Thatcher era very well, I'm surprised anyone would want those days and/or policies back again.

 

And, before anyone jumps to any conclusions, I did very well out of the Thatcher years, but I still think she was possibly THE most divisive, destructive PM we've ever had. Even her own party got rid of her in the end.

 

Perhaps the main thing to remember about the Thatcher years was that she had oil revenue to play with, the like of which no other government in this country ever had before. That revenue could have made this a country fit and ready for the 21st Century. I remember our local MP (he was Headmaster at my old school, which is how come we were having the conversation, years after me leaving school) telling me that whoever was in power when the oil money came ashore had the chance to rebuild this country.

 

It was wasted on tax cuts for the rich, councils housing homeless families in bed and breakfast hotels at anything up to £1000 per week because the government of the day wouldn't release funds to build more housing stock to replace that being sold off, a welfare system that paid billions in Incapacity Benefit to avoid an increase in jobless totals, millions wasted on the Poll Tax, with another £15billion blown on the ERM, although I think that was Major and Lawson by then. Anyone remember Harry Enfield's Bish Bosh LoadsaDosh? House prices inflating like never before and Estate Agents made a profession out of bending the truth and outright lying in some cases, while Cardboard City in Waterloo got bigger and bigger and bigger. Contract cleaning firms at Heathrow and Gatwick paying people £1 per hour for a 12 hour shift. How about Black Monday? Anyone remember that one? Dame Shirley Porter and the Westminster Council Housing scandal, there's a name to conjure with, as they say.

 

I could probably go on all day about the Thatcher Years and, like I say, I did very well out of them.

 

Yeah, let's have those days back again, shall we?

 

Not.

 

These are my opinions formulated over many years and especially during the Thatcher years, I don't want them decried by anyone who, after all, is only expressing their opinion and therefore holds no more currency or validity than mine.

 

Oops, forgot to mention the music, which apart from Haircut 100 and a few other instantly forgotten names, was every bit as good as the 70's. In fact, truth be told, my 80's music folder is bigger than my 70's folder.

Edited January 29, 2013 by Earthling

[LeMarchand]

Oops, forgot to mention the music, which apart from Haircut 100 and a few other instantly forgotten names, was every bit as good as the 70's. In fact, truth be told, my 80's music folder is bigger than my 70's folder.

 

:tinfoil3:I'm convinced that's why there are so many "remember the 80's" music shows on - they want us to remember the one good thing about the decade rather than all the rest that they're trying to bring back.

[aerospacemango]

As someone who remembers the Thatcher era very well, I'm surprised anyone would want those days and/or policies back again.

 

And, before anyone jumps to any conclusions, I did very well out of the Thatcher years, but I still think she was possibly THE most divisive, destructive PM we've ever had. Even her own party got rid of her in the end.

 

Perhaps the main thing to remember about the Thatcher years was that she had oil revenue to play with, the like of which no other government in this country ever had before. That revenue could have made this a country fit and ready for the 21st Century. I remember our local MP (he was Headmaster at my old school, which is how come we were having the conversation, years after me leaving school) telling me that whoever was in power when the oil money came ashore had the chance to rebuild this country.

 

It was wasted on tax cuts for the rich, councils housing homeless families in bed and breakfast hotels at anything up to £1000 per week because the government of the day wouldn't release funds to build more housing stock to replace that being sold off, a welfare system that paid billions in Incapacity Benefit to avoid an increase in jobless totals, millions wasted on the Poll Tax, with another £15billion blown on the ERM, although I think that was Major and Lawson by then. Anyone remember Harry Enfield's Bish Bosh LoadsaDosh? House prices inflating like never before and Estate Agents made a profession out of bending the truth and outright lying in some cases, while Cardboard City in Waterloo got bigger and bigger and bigger. Contract cleaning firms at Heathrow and Gatwick paying people £1 per hour for a 12 hour shift. How about Black Monday? Anyone remember that one? Dame Shirley Porter and the Westminster Council Housing scandal, there's a name to conjure with, as they say.

 

I could probably go on all day about the Thatcher Years and, like I say, I did very well out of them.

 

Yeah, let's have those days back again, shall we?

 

Not.

 

These are my opinions formulated over many years and especially during the Thatcher years, I don't want them decried by anyone who, after all, is only expressing their opinion and therefore holds no more currency or validity than mine.

 

Oops, forgot to mention the music, which apart from Haircut 100 and a few other instantly forgotten names, was every bit as good as the 70's. In fact, truth be told, my 80's music folder is bigger than my 70's folder.

 

Yes, indeed....all of this AND more! The ripples of that government continued through the 90's with Major/Lawson....

 

Anyone remember "Family Values"? "Back to Basics"? All done by a PM who was doing unthinkable things with Edwina (eggs) Currie. Look up John Selwyn Gummer, BSE and his daughter to see the lengths that ANY politician will go to for their government/seat.