The Labour Government

[Ifwecouldjust.......]

Racist Labour Party, no wonder the purples are turning more royal purple.

Labour to unveil big immigration plans next week - but will they win back votes?

Home Secretary Yvette Cooper is set to release her White Paper called "Restoring Control Over the Immigration System".

www.bbc.co.uk

Ive posted before ..... the Blair Government proposed some of the toughest immigration legislation but were blocked by the Tories (who love cheap imported labour as long as it doesn't live in their neighbourhood0

Labour are not the party of open doors that the press would have you believe .

 

[hilts]

Ive posted before ..... the Blair Government proposed some of the toughest immigration legislation but were blocked by the Tories (who love cheap imported labour as long as it doesn't live in their neighbourhood0

Labour are not the party of open doors that the press would have you believe .

It's a subject that many in power are scared of debating openly and honestly. There will be different views within parties but we all see what happens when we try and discuss it on here.

There are people with bad motives on both sides and that ends up scuppering any good solutions.

 

[Vic]

It's a subject that many in power are scared of debating openly and honestly. There will be different views within parties but we all see what happens when we try and discuss it on here.

There are people with bad motives on both sides and that ends up scuppering any good solutions.

Go on then. Tell us what a bad motive is.

 

[hilts]

Go on then. Tell us what a bad motive is.

Bad motive refers to a person's intention or desire to do something wrong or harmful. It can also mean that a person knows that their actions are wrong but still chooses to do them

Didn't think you woukd an explanation tbh:-)

 

[Oldham Exile]

Any US beef I've eaten has been great and I've not grown an extra head or anything.

I would love to be able to get prime rib over here

 

[Brewster's millions]

Ive posted before ..... the Blair Government proposed some of the toughest immigration legislation but were blocked by the Tories (who love cheap imported labour as long as it doesn't live in their neighbourhood0

Labour are not the party of open doors that the press would have you believe .

I think this is right up there with your claim that Labour killed off PFI when they got into power in 1997.

You appear to have forgotten that the Labour government chose not to implement any transitional controls on immigration from the A8 countries in 2004 - the only major EU economy to do so - and that they did this purely for economic reasons.

They wanted the cheap imported labour to depress wage growth, keep interest rates low and boost headline growth, which was already faltering at that point. And the leadership did this despite warnings that the UK’s extreme position would lead to a disproportionate number of A8 migrants heading to the UK.

The official Home Office estimate prior to 2004 was that A8 immigration would only run at 5-13k per annum, but crucially this was based on the assumption that no major EU country would implement transitional controls. When it became clear that this assumption was entirely wrong, the UK still pressed ahead with its open door policy and A8 immigration was pushing 100k per annum by 2007. And all for the short term benefit of cheap imported labour.

 

[Vic]

Bad motive refers to a person's intention or desire to do something wrong or harmful. It can also mean that a person knows that their actions are wrong but still chooses to do them

Didn't think you woukd an explanation tbh:-)

Good grief. Who are the "people with bad motives on both sides" of talking about immigration?

 

[hilts]

Good grief. Who are the "people with bad motives on both sides" of talking about immigration?

Sorry that was naughty but justified I feel.

Example of good and bad motive for less immigration whether right or wrong because I can't be arsed arguing over immigration for the 10,000 time:-)

Me - I don't like immigration due to environmental reasons and believe it puts a strain on public services as they can never catch up and the cost of doing so diminishes a lot of the benefits.



Farage - uses it to gain votes and would quite happily have promoted immigration if he benefited from it in my honest opinion.

 

[metalblue]

Ive posted before ..... the Blair Government proposed some of the toughest immigration legislation but were blocked by the Tories (who love cheap imported labour as long as it doesn't live in their neighbourhood0

Labour are not the party of open doors that the press would have you believe .

On the surface this looks like anti-immigration/ lurching further to the right but the opening words in that article are “a failed free market system”. What could be more socialist than decrying the free market?

In its essence it is trying to promote British labour over imported labour - I see both left and right get something out of this policy. Clever politics if she can pull it off.

 

[The Light Was Yellow Sir]

I think this is right up there with your claim that Labour killed off PFI when they got into power in 1997.

You appear to have forgotten that the Labour government chose not to implement any transitional controls on immigration from the A8 countries in 2004 - the only major EU economy to do so - and that they did this purely for economic reasons.

They wanted the cheap imported labour to depress wage growth, keep interest rates low and boost headline growth, which was already faltering at that point. And the leadership did this despite warnings that the UK’s extreme position would lead to a disproportionate number of A8 migrants heading to the UK.

The official Home Office estimate prior to 2004 was that A8 immigration would only run at 5-13k per annum, but crucially this was based on the assumption that no major EU country would implement transitional controls. When it became clear that this assumption was entirely wrong, the UK still pressed ahead with its open door policy and A8 immigration was pushing 100k per annum by 2007. And all for the short term benefit of cheap imported labour.

And yet, post Brexit, look at it now.
From 1994 until 2020, net migration bounced around between 100 and 200 thousand a year. Post taking back control, we’re at 1.2-1.3 MILLION a year. So, 13 years of Labour net migration superseded by 2 years of Tory net migration. Not only that, Labour migration was, as you rightly point out, mainly A8 migration.
These A8 immigrants were far less likely than the UK population to claim benefits, tax credits, live in social housing or use NHS services. Through taxes, indirect taxes in particular, they made a net contribution to the UK finances.
On average they were much younger than the native population and better educated than the native population. All somewhat different to the current make up of immigrants…
Also, Sweden and the ROI had the ‘open door policy’ as well.

 

[Mazzarelli's Swiss Cheese]

Good grief. Who are the "people with bad motives on both sides" of talking about immigration?

Xenophobes on one side (against), and abusers of cheap labour (for) on the other.
There are of course many more nuanced arguments on both sides in-between those extreme positions.

 

[hilts]

And yet, post Brexit, look at it now.
From 1994 until 2020, net migration bounced around between 100 and 200 thousand a year. Post taking back control, we’re at 1.2-1.3 MILLION a year. So, 13 years of Labour net migration superseded by 2 years of Tory net migration. Not only that, Labour migration was, as you rightly point out, mainly A8 migration.
These A8 immigrants were far less likely than the UK population to claim benefits, tax credits, live in social housing or use NHS services. Through taxes, indirect taxes in particular, they made a net contribution to the UK finances.
On average they were much younger than the native population and better educated than the native population. All somewhat different to the current make up of immigrants…
Also, Sweden and the ROI had the ‘open door policy’ as well.

These are the types of discussions we on here, in the country and the powers that be should be having.

Numbers and skills if other ways have been exhausted.

 

[metalblue]

My sister recently took a pay off from her company ( acrimoniously as is so often the way in the private sector as you approach 60) after a good, well paid career . She is a very able senior manager. She is financially secure and could retire but didn't feel ready so looked for some part-time work. Took a part time fixed contract position with her local NHS trust in a team looking to improve service delivery, job is talking to stakeholders etc, formulating plans etc .
She imagined the culture would be different from what she is used to and in that regard she hasn't been disappointed....
A few weeks in she was invited to a Team event held a nice local hotel. Spent the day on A " Bridgerton" themed day, making period costumes and then had the opportunity to spend time with a therapy dog to relieve her stress.Now its fair to say these sort of things also happen in the private sector , however what my sister has already learnt was that there was no need for a therapy dog - because there is no stress !
She says there is no jeopardy of losing your job , you would have to kill someone. What for her are the usual rules of do what your paid to do or be fired just doesn't exist.
The ethos apparently is to " Be kind" to one another and it seems that takes precedence over everything else.
No one on her team works full time, all are part time, those who started as full time reduced their hours. Add in to that almost total freedom to work from home as you see fit and the result is that nobody is hardly ever available when you need to speak to them, so everything proceeds at a sclerotic pace .Nothing is done within timeframes, deadlines come and go, every excuse is accepted.Everyone looks busy because everything is a priority, there is no focus.
Her boss recognises her experience and keeps asking for her to give feedback on the efficiency of the team. my sister just avoids it as she says there would be no way of telling her without breaking the relationship because she says the truth is the whole set up actually just functions to provide comfortable employment for its participants and if the whole thing was wound up tomorrow and the team made redundant , it would make no meaningful difference whatsoever. Sadly , she says that they simply would not recognise that fact, they don't get it.
They are not facing any cuts it would seem.
To hear that frontline staff are facing redundancy when this is going on ... shocking.

I know when Mrs MB moved departments in her last trust it took something like 5 months for HR to do it all. They’d (HR) manufactured a process where they didn’t look at the job offer (to formalise it) for 3 months. They’d manufactured this bottleneck/delay but the CEO looks at that and thinks HR are incredibly busy and can’t lose anyone. So the budget cut focus moves elsewhere. There are undoubtedly huge inefficiencies in some parts of every trust and some parts deeply underfunded/under staffed. This is where the argument that the NHS is properly funded comes from.

In her current department I understand the trust gets paid a little extra for every patient contact. That’s extra revenue there for the CEO. A B5 on a ward doesn’t “generate” extra trust revenue. Now when they review the budget for that department later this year she might not continue in her job if the money she brings in doesn’t cover her role. We seem to be at a junction where money not patients are the primary driver. It’s a bit of a mess really.

As I’ve said before Streeting does appear to be a politician across his brief (refreshingly) so once he gets a handle on it I do expect some rethinks (assuming he can persuade Reeves anyway). As it’s now in the mainstream press they won’t have any excuses if they don’t.

 

[Oldham Exile]

Ive posted before ..... the Blair Government proposed some of the toughest immigration legislation but were blocked by the Tories (who love cheap imported labour as long as it doesn't live in their neighbourhood0

Labour are not the party of open doors that the press would have you believe .

Just because you have posted such nonsense before does not mean that it is anything but nonsense (I'm referring to the Blair government not the current one)

 

[Oldham Exile]

I think this is right up there with your claim that Labour killed off PFI when they got into power in 1997.

You appear to have forgotten that the Labour government chose not to implement any transitional controls on immigration from the A8 countries in 2004 - the only major EU economy to do so - and that they did this purely for economic reasons.

They wanted the cheap imported labour to depress wage growth, keep interest rates low and boost headline growth, which was already faltering at that point. And the leadership did this despite warnings that the UK’s extreme position would lead to a disproportionate number of A8 migrants heading to the UK.

The official Home Office estimate prior to 2004 was that A8 immigration would only run at 5-13k per annum, but crucially this was based on the assumption that no major EU country would implement transitional controls. When it became clear that this assumption was entirely wrong, the UK still pressed ahead with its open door policy and A8 immigration was pushing 100k per annum by 2007. And all for the short term benefit of cheap imported labour.

If he/she has claimed that then he/she really is posting utter crap

 

[ganganvince]

My sister recently took a pay off from her company ( acrimoniously as is so often the way in the private sector as you approach 60) after a good, well paid career . She is a very able senior manager. She is financially secure and could retire but didn't feel ready so looked for some part-time work. Took a part time fixed contract position with her local NHS trust in a team looking to improve service delivery, job is talking to stakeholders etc, formulating plans etc .
She imagined the culture would be different from what she is used to and in that regard she hasn't been disappointed....
A few weeks in she was invited to a Team event held a nice local hotel. Spent the day on A " Bridgerton" themed day, making period costumes and then had the opportunity to spend time with a therapy dog to relieve her stress.Now its fair to say these sort of things also happen in the private sector , however what my sister has already learnt was that there was no need for a therapy dog - because there is no stress !
She says there is no jeopardy of losing your job , you would have to kill someone. What for her are the usual rules of do what your paid to do or be fired just doesn't exist.
The ethos apparently is to " Be kind" to one another and it seems that takes precedence over everything else.
No one on her team works full time, all are part time, those who started as full time reduced their hours. Add in to that almost total freedom to work from home as you see fit and the result is that nobody is hardly ever available when you need to speak to them, so everything proceeds at a sclerotic pace .Nothing is done within timeframes, deadlines come and go, every excuse is accepted.Everyone looks busy because everything is a priority, there is no focus.
Her boss recognises her experience and keeps asking for her to give feedback on the efficiency of the team. my sister just avoids it as she says there would be no way of telling her without breaking the relationship because she says the truth is the whole set up actually just functions to provide comfortable employment for its participants and if the whole thing was wound up tomorrow and the team made redundant , it would make no meaningful difference whatsoever. Sadly , she says that they simply would not recognise that fact, they don't get it.
They are not facing any cuts it would seem.
To hear that frontline staff are facing redundancy when this is going on ... shocking.

I am an efficiency engineer by trade (retired) working mainly in Automotive a few years back during a lean period my senior manager was allowed to go on a 12 month secondment to NHS England. The amount of waste, duplication and unnecessary positions identified was mind boggling reports submitted as yet no confirmation of action on a single recommendation.

 

[The Light Was Yellow Sir]

I am an efficiency engineer by trade (retired) working mainly in Automotive a few years back during a lean period my senior manager was allowed to go on a 12 month secondment to NHS England. The amount of waste, duplication and unnecessary positions identified was mind boggling reports submitted as yet no confirmation of action on a single recommendation.

Whilst I’m sure some of what you report is true, many of those roles are created to provide ‘assurance’ to ministers.

As for, recommendations not being acted on, you could come up with a scheme to improve things in all sorts of ways, save heaps of money over 5 years and a myriad of improvements but, they usually involve a period of ‘double running’ and there’s just never any spare cash to do it because the books have to balance every, single year.
The NHS suffers from over interference from government, usually headed by a minister who is either clueless or wants to ‘make their mark’. It then has to put up with local politicians, who will say one thing whilst believing something altogether different and of course, finally, the great British public, who are, understandably, clueless on the benefits of specialisation and, for complex stuff, centralisation.
Finally, even if you could prove you’d save money and improve outcomes by doing X, you’d have to go to consultation and, sadly, most people think having a shit hospital close by is better than a great hospital 40 miles away!
That having an A&E on the doorstep is better than a trauma unit possibly some miles away with a minor injuries unit close by.

If it were run as a business, as is oft suggested, the NHS would not offer universal treatment, it would certainly not have 170 A&E departments, it would join up with social care, it would take decisions locally rather than nationally as one size does not fit all. Most of it would be done outside of hospitals, and people would have to travel for the very best care. And it would be mostly free from government meddling…

 

[ganganvince]

Whilst I’m sure some of what you report is true, many of those roles are created to provide ‘assurance’ to ministers.

As for, recommendations not being acted on, you could come up with a scheme to improve things in all sorts of ways, save heaps of money over 5 years and a myriad of improvements but, they usually involve a period of ‘double running’ and there’s just never any spare cash to do it because the books have to balance every, single year.
The NHS suffers from over interference from government, usually headed by a minister who is either clueless or wants to ‘make their mark’. It then has to put up with local politicians, who will say one thing whilst believing something altogether different and of course, finally, the great British public, who are, understandably, clueless on the benefits of specialisation and, for complex stuff, centralisation.
Finally, even if you could prove you’d save money and improve outcomes by doing X, you’d have to go to consultation and, sadly, most people think having a shit hospital close by is better than a great hospital 40 miles away!
That having an A&E on the doorstep is better than a trauma unit possibly some miles away with a minor injuries unit close by.

If it were run as a business, as is oft suggested, the NHS would not offer universal treatment, it would certainly not have 170 A&E departments, it would join up with social care, it would take decisions locally rather than nationally as one size does not fit all. Most of it would be done outside of hospitals, and people would have to travel for the very best care. And it would be mostly free from government meddling…

Nothing to do with closing hospitals, all to do with utilisation of current workforce.

 

[threespires]

With the caveat that I didn't watch the programme myself, the BBC are reporting that Yvette Cooper suggested this morning that there would be no further recruitment of 'low-skilled' workers from overseas into the care sector.

How's this going to work? How are organisations going to recruit into these roles? The jobs are often onerous and the pay is crap. I very much doubt most British people would do it willingly for the money and though there are plenty of individual carers looking after loved ones there is no broader culture of seeing caring as a socially or morally necessary activity as there is in some other cultures. The very best and most dignified care and support my brother has received has been from people from overseas and on the couple of instances it's been appalling, in both cases it was the result of one or more disinterested native youngsters who clearly were doing the role in the absence of something better to do and where the level of supervision was completely inadequate to mitigate this disinterest.

You can argue that it's exploiting cheap labour from overseas and that needs to stop but that requires a joined up plan. So unless they are going to mandate and support significant improvement of conditions I can't see how they are doing anything other than declaring they've given up on looking after the vulnerable. Unless I'm missing something here?

Edit: apparently Cooper also said there would be a 'new fair pay agreement' to make it more attractive for British workers. I'm extremely sceptical they understand what that involves and the fact that she said nothing about the challenge of finding people who exhibit the necessary behaviours and values suggests to me that this hasn't been thought through in any depth and is yet another attempt to compete with Reform on immigration which is an utterly futile pursuit.

 

[bluethrunthru]

You saw no reporting of this in the Right Leaning press - you'd have thought the politicians local and national would be pleased and shouting about it as its jobs for their constituents - oh yeah I remember they are all Reform aren't they?

Japan-owned car battery maker secures £1bn to build second Sunderland gigafactory

Site likely to create 1,000-plus jobs as AESC wins £680m from UK government plus £320m in private finance and equity

www.theguardian.com